Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 17 January 2024
1477. Deputy Peadar Tóibín asked the Minister for Health the steps he has taken to support health care professionals to return to Ireland; and the number that have returned to Ireland in each of the past ten years. [56407/23]
View answerThe HSE has undertaken a project using doctor Medical Council numbers to track the actual numbers of doctors leaving and returning to the Irish health system over time. Data was sourced from the National Doctors Training and Planning Doctors Integrated Management E-System (DIME). DIME records registration, training and employment details of all Consultant and Non-Consultant Hospital Doctors (NCHDs) in Ireland who are employed in the Public Service. As part of this work doctor retention was examined focusing on the risk of exit from the Irish system at the beginning and end of training i.e. following intern year and end of postgraduate training programme. The findings indicate that while there are patterns of high outward migration at various stages of NCHDs careers, there is a pattern of return with a high number returning to commence further post graduate training and/or take up a Consultant post in Ireland. This work was recently published in the Irish Journal of Medical Sciences link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11845-023-03288-8. Key findings are outlined below:
• Review of intern year 2015-2020 data indicates a trend of interns leaving the system immediately following intern year however a substantial number have returned to HSE within 2-3 years.
• 84% of interns who commenced intern training in 2015 subsequently commenced a Basic Specialist Training or General Practice (GP) training programme in subsequent years (2016-2021).
• Of those who completed BST training in 2017, 75% went on to higher specialist training (HST) in Ireland.
• In 2021, of the 2016 cohort of doctors who completed specialist training (excluding GP training programme) 68% are employed in Ireland and 32% are abroad or unknown.
• In Ireland it is very common for doctors who have completed postgraduate training to undertake a Fellowship or experience abroad before taking up a consultant post. When tracking retention it is important to take into consideration this trend.
The National Doctors Training and Planning Office of the HSE are currently finalising an Annual Medicine Retention report for 2023, to be published in Q1 2024 which highlights the most recent data on doctor retention rates. In addition to the findings above the report highlights that there has been a substantial improvement in the retention rates of doctors who complete specialist training (excluding GP training) in the 2018 and 2019 cohorts with 75% and 78% respectively working in public or private posts in Ireland in 2023.
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has analysed medicine graduates’ migration patterns using administrative data. Where a graduate was ‘not captured’ in any administrative data set, they are assumed to have emigrated. However, this is not a definitive indicator of emigration.
The 2011 cohort of graduates is the first group of graduates for which this analysis was conducted. Of this cohort:
• 35% were ‘not captured’ for at least one year in the 10 years since they graduated. Of these, 43% later returned.
• 14%, were ‘not captured’ for more than 8 years.
The HSE Resourcing Strategy was launched in June 2023 and is an action orientated Strategy aimed to be delivered by the HSE. It sets out a comprehensive list of actions which aim to meet the current and future needs of the Organisation. A core element of the HSE Resourcing Strategy involves enhancing the Organisation’s capacity to develop, retain and engage the workforce that will ensure a sufficient domestic supply of health care staff for the future.
