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Health Workforce Challenges and Solutions: A Focus on Population Needs

A special issue of International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (ISSN 1660-4601).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 January 2024) | Viewed by 6390

Special Issue Editors

1. Health Care Management, College of Business Government and Law, Flinders University, Adelaide, SA 5042, Australia
2. Menzies Centre for Health Policy and Economics, School of Public Health, The University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia
Interests: health services and health systems (including practice patterns; service provision; health workforce; integrated care); future trends in health care (including e-health; electronic health records; innovations); methodological issues (including mixed methods; national surveys; data linkage)
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
School of Dentistry, Faculty of Health and Behavioural Sciences, University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD 4072, Australia
Interests: public health; public health policymaking; health service research; policy analysis
School of Social Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Gelugor, Penang 11800, Malaysia
Interests: health services; health workforce; health policy; health law; sociology of health; sociology of knowledge

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

It is our pleasure to announce a new Special Issue titled “Health Workforce Challenges and Solutions: A Focus on Population Needs”. This Special Issue follows a successful Special Issue on the future health workforce and the next chapter of our health workforce collection in the journal.

Undeniably, the health workforce is the backbone of health systems. Doctors, nurses, dentists, pharmacists, and allied health workers are vital to the functioning of any health system. The importance of healthcare workers, especially the social and welfare workforce, is becoming more important in a post-COVID-19 world.

Solutions aimed at redesigning the health workforce need to be people-centric and more responsive to population needs. However, it is still unclear to what extent the current health workforce design addresses or meets population needs. In many countries, health workforce distribution is biased towards urban or city areas. Primary and preventative care workforce is lacking in many countries. There are growing challenges due to transition environments (demographic, epidemiological, social, and technological), and solutions that are applicable to one country/content might not be necessarily suitable for another country or content. Tailoring health workforce solutions to meet current and future heath challenges, address professional sensitivities, and curated to meet population needs is a growing body of research.

Globally, there is an improved focus towards addressing health workforce challenges and meeting population needs. It is encouraging news that the WHO has initiated a Global Strategy on Human Resources for Health: Workforce 2030. Several key research teams are actively involved in addressing health workforce challenges that involve models of care, integrated approaches, scope of practice, regulation, and workforce planning. 

The following are the key issues to be addressed in the Special Issue:

  • Health workforce planning and policy solutions to address population needs;
  • How do we sensitise the health profession to the growing needs of the public?
  • Trade-offs between technology and health workforce;
  • Population-centric health workforce solutions that also focus on patient safety and quality of care;
  • Regulatory frameworks and scope of practice;
  • New methodologies and solutions in health workforce planning;
  • Application of health workforce design solutions to education systems.

For this Special Issue, we have decided to take a population-focused approach and encourage articles that identify health workforce challenges and solutions towards meeting population needs in the global south and global north. Broadly, we welcome articles that cover challenges at an education, practice, or regulation level required to facilitate innovative health workforce solutions. We plan to include a wide range of health workforce articles that spread across all health professions or disciplines (medicine, nursing, pharmacy, dentistry, allied health, social and welfare workforce).

We encourage both quantitative and qualitative research articles, as well as systematic reviews or commentaries/perspectives. Well-written articles displaying methodological rigour will be preferred.

Please do not hesitate to email us for any queries or interesting article ideas or content.

Dr. Madhan Balasubramanian
Dr. Peivand Bastani
Dr. Farah Purwaningrum
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2500 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • health workforce
  • integrated care
  • models of care
  • workforce planning
  • patient-centric care
  • workforce policy
  • interdisciplinary education
  • collaborative practice
  • teamwork

Related Special Issue

Published Papers (2 papers)

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14 pages, 813 KiB  
Review
Limitations and Recommendations for Advancing the Occupational Therapy Workforce Research Worldwide: Scoping Review and Content Analysis of the Literature
by Tiago S. Jesus, Karthik Mani, Ritchard Ledgerd, Sureshkumar Kamalakannan, Sutanuka Bhattacharjya, Claudia von Zweck and World Federation of Occupational Therapists
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022, 19(12), 7327; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19127327 - 15 Jun 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 3377
Abstract
Occupational therapy workforce research can help determine whether occupational therapists exist in sufficient supply, are equitably distributed, and meet competency standards. Advancing the value of occupational therapy workforce research requires an understanding of the limitations and recommendations identified by these investigations. This scoping [...] Read more.
Occupational therapy workforce research can help determine whether occupational therapists exist in sufficient supply, are equitably distributed, and meet competency standards. Advancing the value of occupational therapy workforce research requires an understanding of the limitations and recommendations identified by these investigations. This scoping review and content analysis synthesizes the study limitations and recommendations reported by the occupational therapy research worldwide. Two independent reviews included 57 papers from the past 25 years. Stated limitations included: focus on cross-sectional studies with small and convenience samples; participants from single settings or regions; local markets or preferences not specified; focus on self-reported data and intentions (rather than behaviors or occurrences); challenges in aggregating or synthesizing findings from descriptive data; lack of statistical adjustment for testing multiple associations; and the lack of detailed, up-to-date, and accessible workforce data for continuous monitoring and secondary research. Stated recommendations included: strengthening routine workforce data collection; developing longitudinal studies that include interventions (e.g., recruitment or retention packages); developing context-sensitive comparisons; studying the impact on ultimate outcomes; promoting nation-wide, coordinated workforce plans and requirements; and fostering international coalitions for workforce research and developments at scale. These study limitations and recommendations reported by the literature must be considered in the design of a local and global occupational therapy workforce research agenda. Full article
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10 pages, 1483 KiB  
Concept Paper
A Teledentistry Pilot Study on Patient-Initiated Care
by Clare Lin, Nuno Goncalves, Ben Scully, Ruth Heredia and Shalika Hegde
Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022, 19(15), 9403; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19159403 - 31 Jul 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1803
Abstract
COVID-19 has challenged the public dental workforce in their ability to continue providing routine oral health care services. To mitigate the risk of COVID-19 transmission to staff and patients, Teledentistry was implemented in many parts of the world, mainly to provide remote consultations, [...] Read more.
COVID-19 has challenged the public dental workforce in their ability to continue providing routine oral health care services. To mitigate the risk of COVID-19 transmission to staff and patients, Teledentistry was implemented in many parts of the world, mainly to provide remote consultations, undertake triage, and offer preventive educational sessions. The aim of this paper is to describe Dental Health Services Victoria’s (DHSV) patient-initiated Teledentistry model of care implemented during peak COVID transmission in Victoria. The Teledentistry model supported patient-centered care involving active collaboration and shared decision making between patients, families, and clinicians in designing and managing remote care plans. DHSV’s eligible patient cohort includes disadvantaged population groups with greater oral health needs. Strong emphasis was placed on the simplicity and user friendliness of the Telehealth platform, as well as the support for patients with low technology literacy. Consumers and dental workforce were consulted and modifications to the use of language and services were undertaken before the launch. A total of 2492 patients accessed Telehealth services between May 2020 and April 2021. Approximately 39% of patients were born in a country other than Australia. A total of 489 patient-reported experience measures (PREMs) were received. Patients agreed or strongly agreed that the care they received met their needs (87%); they received answers to their questions (89%); they left their visit knowing what is next (87%); they felt they were taken care of during their visit (90%); and they felt involved in their treatment (89%). Teledentistry enabled patients to initiate access to care and consult with dental workforce remotely and safely during peak pandemic. Full article
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