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    Patterns of resident health workforce turnover and retention in remote communities of the Northern Territory of Australia, 2013-2015.

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    Author
    Russell, DJ; Zhao, Y; Guthridge, S; Ramjan, M; Jones, MP; Humphreys, JS; Wakerman, J
    Date
    2017-08-15
    Source Title
    Human Resources for Health
    Publisher
    Springer Science and Business Media LLC
    University of Melbourne Author/s
    Russell, Deborah
    Affiliation
    Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research
    Metadata
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    Document Type
    Journal Article
    Citations
    Russell, D. J., Zhao, Y., Guthridge, S., Ramjan, M., Jones, M. P., Humphreys, J. S. & Wakerman, J. (2017). Patterns of resident health workforce turnover and retention in remote communities of the Northern Territory of Australia, 2013-2015.. Hum Resour Health, 15 (1), pp.52-. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12960-017-0229-9.
    Access Status
    Open Access
    URI
    http://hdl.handle.net/11343/255614
    DOI
    10.1186/s12960-017-0229-9
    Open Access at PMC
    http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5558760
    Abstract
    BACKGROUND: The geographical maldistribution of the health workforce is a persisting global issue linked to inequitable access to health services and poorer health outcomes for rural and remote populations. In the Northern Territory (NT), anecdotal reports suggest that the primary care workforce in remote Aboriginal communities is characterised by high turnover, low stability and high use of temporary staffing; however, there is a lack of reliable information to guide workforce policy improvements. This study quantifies current turnover and retention in remote NT communities and investigates correlations between turnover and retention metrics and health service/community characteristics. METHODS: This study used the NT Department of Health 2013-2015 payroll and financial datasets for resident health workforce in 53 remote primary care clinics. Main outcome measures include annual turnover rates, annual stability rates, 12-month survival probabilities and median survival. RESULTS: At any time point, the clinics had a median of 2.0 nurses, 0.6 Aboriginal health practitioners (AHPs), 2.2 other employees and 0.4 additional agency-employed nurses. Mean annual turnover rates for nurses and AHPs combined were extremely high, irrespective of whether turnover was defined as no longer working in any remote clinic (66%) or no longer working at a specific remote clinic (128%). Stability rates were low, and only 20% of nurses and AHPs remain working at a specific remote clinic 12 months after commencing. Half left within 4 months. Nurse and AHP turnover correlated with other workforce measures. However, there was little correlation between most workforce metrics and health service characteristics. CONCLUSIONS: NT Government-funded remote clinics are small, experience very high staff turnover and make considerable use of agency nurses. These staffing patterns, also found in remote settings elsewhere in Australia and globally, not only incur higher direct costs for service provision-and therefore may compromise long-term sustainability-but also are almost certainly contributing to sub-optimal continuity of care, compromised health outcomes and poorer levels of staff safety. To address these deficiencies, it is imperative that investments in implementing, adequately resourcing and evaluating staffing models which stabilise the remote primary care workforce occur as a matter of priority.

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