Universities peak body calls for healthcare training changes

The long-term plan to fill the 112,000 vacancies within the National Health System (NHS) will not work without “significant changes” to healthcare education and training, Universities UK has warned, writes Paul Gallagher for iNews.

The success of the NHS Long Term Workforce Plan, published by the UK government in June this year, hinges on co-operation between education and healthcare providers to prevent “the talent pipeline from drying up”, the group representing 142 universities has warned. With applications to nursing, midwifery and allied health professional courses declining, a “major national recruitment campaign” is needed to find the medics of the future – while shortages in clinical academic and teaching staff could also prove a bottleneck.

The NHS has been plagued by huge numbers of vacancies in recent years, reaching a peak of around 132,000 at the start of the year. Although record numbers of nurses and doctors have entered the profession, even more are falling out of the healthcare service – as dissatisfaction manifests in strikes by NHS staff over years of real-terms pay cuts.
Full report on the iNews site