Health workforce planning: which countries include Nurse Practitioners and Physician Assistants and to what effect?

An increasing number of countries are changing the composition and skill-mix of their health workforce. Skill-mix is defined as the mix of health professions, and the mix of their skills and roles, which enables them to respond to changing patient needs [1]. Many countries worldwide have introduced new professional roles, such as Nurse Practitioners (NPs) or Physician Assistants (PAs) [2 –5]. The reasons include the more complex needs of patients with chronic conditions and/or a geographical maldistribution of health professionals [5,6].

Source: Health Policy - August 11, 2018 Category: Health Management Authors: Claudia B Maier, Ronald Batenburg, Steve Birch, Britta Zander, Robert Elliott, Reinhard Busse Source Type: research