U.S. has a shortage of trained health workers

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Help wanted: U.S. has a shortage of trained health workers

Hospitals scramble for pharmacy technicians, lab scientists and other

trained workers as baby boomers age and retire.

By Engel, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer July 27, 2008

During a typical 12-hour shift, can be found in just

about any corner of Kaiser Sunset, tending to premature infants and

the elderly, to patients with asthma and those with AIDS, to heart

attack victims and survivors of car wrecks.

He connects patients to ventilators, evaluates lung capacity and blood

gases and administers oxygen and aerosol medications. Clad in green

scrubs and white running shoes, he is often the first to arrive on a

" code blue " -- the term that is broadcast when a patient has stopped

breathing.

Yet most of those he sees probably could not name his occupation.

, 49, is not a doctor or a nurse but a respiratory care

practitioner.

" A lot of people don't hear much about respiratory therapists, " he

said. " We're there. We help you. We're gone. "

Many patients also probably don't know that there are barely enough

respiratory care therapists to go around.

Most people have heard about the nationwide nursing shortage. But the

country is also experiencing a shortage of trained workers in the

" allied health professions " -- respiratory care practitioners, medical

transcriptionists, radiographers and about 200 other occupations that

make up about 60% of healthcare workers.

" We call them the hidden healthcare workforce, " said Chapman,

director of allied healthstudies at the UC San Francisco Center for

the Health Professions. " In the policy arena, there isn't a lot of

attention being paid to those folks. "

Yet the care they provide is vital. " You can't run a hospital without

people to take the X-rays or do the lab tests, " Chapman said.

According to a recent study, California, with its burgeoning

population, lags behind the rest of the nation in the number of allied

health professionals per capita.

If he wanted to, , who has worked at Kaiser Permanente Los

Angeles Medical Center in Hollywood for 22 years, could moonlight at

three hospitals a week.

And as baby boomers like , who now make up much of the allied

health workforce, begin to retire, demand is expected to outstrip

supply in at least nine of 15 occupations surveyed. Those with the

highest projected need include pharmacy technicians, dental hygienists

and physical therapist assistants.

" The aging of the population is a double whammy, " said Michele

Siqueiros, executive director of the nonprofit Campaign for College

Opportunity. " It drives up demand [for health services] at the same

time that people will be retiring from the very jobs that will be needed. "

The campaign, a coalition of California business, labor and community

groups, joined with Kaiser Permanente and the California Wellness

Foundation last fall to commission the study.

The allied health profession is a large and varied group. Some, like

laboratory scientists (who analyze blood and other bodily fluids),

need a bachelor's degree. Pharmacists, licensed social workers and

physical therapists need advanced degrees.

But most allied health jobs do not require four years of college.

Training programs after high school can lead to state certification to

be an emergency medical technician (who provides emergency care and

transport) or a pharmacy technician (who counts pills, labels bottles

and works the pharmacy counter). Community colleges offer two-year

associate degrees for medical radiographers (who position patients for

mammograms and other imaging machines) and for respiratory care

practitioners like .

And although some jobs are relatively low-paying -- the median wage

for an EMT in 2005-06 was $12.19 an hour -- others pay two or three

times that, according to the study. The median wage for dental

hygienists was $36.83. The highest median wage was for pharmacists, at

$53.03.

Yet despite the decent pay, to meet the need for clinical laboratory

scientists -- median wage, $32.36 an hour -- the state would have to

produce 559% more graduates in that field alone in the next six years,

the study found.

" Laboratory sciences are just critical to our delivery of healthcare

in an acute-care hospital, " said E. Seaver, president and chief

executive of Henry Mayo Newhall Memorial Hospital in Valencia. " But

they are out of sight, out of mind. "

The factors driving the shortages are similar to those behind the

nursing shortage, experts say.

Allied health workers make more money in the clinic than in the

classroom, leading to faculty shortages. Community colleges,

underfunded and independently operated, do a poor job of letting

students who are on a waiting list at one college know about available

seats at another.

Attrition rates are high because many students are ill-prepared

academically when they enter college and juggle classes with work and

family obligations. Little is offered in the way of tutoring,

counseling or financial aid.

Public-private partnerships to fix some of these problems in nursing

education are already showing results, said Siqueiros, who is calling

for similar steps -- and funding -- for the allied health fields.

Some hospitals, Kaiser among them, already work with community

colleges to recruit and prepare students.

When Jerry Saldana became manager of respiratory care services at

Kaiser Sunset, he knew that wages didn't explain the problems he was

having filling vacancies: The starting salary for respiratory care

practitioners right out of school is $29 an hour plus full benefits.

There just weren't enough applicants to go around. So he set up

partnerships with East Los Angeles College, Mt. San College in

Walnut and Concorde Career Colleges to do the clinical training, which

makes up the program's second year, at Kaiser.

" We get to see the students here for a year, train them here, " he

said. " I've hired quite a few right out of school. "

The worsening economy has sparked interest in the program among

mid-career workers who have lost their jobs to downsizing or are

seeking stable work. The field also attracts immigrants who worked in

a health profession in their home countries.

" We're making some ground on the awareness side, " said UC San

Francisco's Chapman. " But we still have a long way to go to have a

serious, sustained commitment to this. Like in nursing, it's not

something that's going to be resolved overnight. "

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-me-shortage27-2008jul27,0,4044906.story