An approach to estimating human resource requirements to achieve the Millennium Development Goals

Abstract

In the context of the Millennium Development Goals, human resources represent the most critical constraint in achieving the targets. Therefore, it is important for health planners and decision-makers to identify what are the human resources required to meet those targets. Planning the human resources for health is a complex process. It needs to consider both the technical aspects related to estimating the number, skills and distribution of health personnel for meeting population health needs, and the political implications, values and choices that health policy- and decision-makers need to make within given resources limitations. After presenting an overview of the various methods for planning human resources for health, with their advantages and limitations, this paper proposes a methodological approach to estimating the requirements of human resources to achieve the goals set forth by the Millennium Declaration. The method builds on the service-target approach and functional job analysis.

Comparing health workforce forecasting approaches for healthcare planning: The case for ophthalmologists

“…[10,11] In the workforce-topopulation approach, the best ratio from a reference country or region with a slightly more developed healthcare sector than that to be investigated is assumed to be the benchmark. [12] For instance, in 2012, the number of ophthalmologists per million population is 112 in France, 81 in Germany, and 99 in Switzerland. [13] Despite its apparent advantage due to its speed and ease of application, this approach often does not consider factors such as productivity, utilization, and distribution of healthcare personnel, making interpretation of the results difficult.…”

“…Therefore, the problem of unequal distribution of healthcare workforce is likely to persist even with the projected estimates. [12,14] The needs based approach projects the health workforce requirements based on the current estimated healthcare needs of a population. Healthcare needs refer to the number of healthcare professionals or quantity of services required to provide optimal healthcare services to maintain a healthy population.…”

“…Thus, projected staff and service targets may be unattainable. [12] Utilization based approaches estimate the future healthcare workforce requirements using the current levels of services utilized by the population as a proxy for satisfied demand. Satisfied demand here refers to the levels of healthcare services a population will seek and have the ability to acquire at the current pricing within a certain timeframe.…”

“…[15] The utilization based approach is useful in predicting economically feasible targets due to the assumption that there is little or no change in the populationspecific utilization patterns. [12] Moreover, it is effective in studies of geographical variations, where utilization patterns are stratified. However, changes in future utilization patterns are not accounted for and can lead to skewed projections.…”

Needs-based gap analysis for service transformation in the Eastern Cape

“…[2] A needsbased approach is independent of past use and therefore allows for equitable and efficient resource allocation. Dreesch et al [3] draw attention to the limitations of a needs-based approach, which include projection of unattainable staff requirements, extensive data collection and norms updating as technology advances.…”