The Wisconsin Hospital Association says the state’s health care workforce “must grow faster” to meet the needs of an aging population.
In its latest Wisconsin Health Care Workforce Report, the group says hospitals in the state are already seeing some signs of improvement “as vacancies lessen” and turnover stabilizes thanks to efforts to fortify the industry’s labor pool.
The report points to care providers working to retain existing workers, bring new workers into the field and “re-recruit those who left for what they thought might be greener pastures” in other industries. Still, WHA argues industry members, health care professionals and officials in government and education should seek to unlock the potential of health care teams to “sustain this comeback” despite demographic headwinds.
“They need to leverage innovative technologies to achieve greater efficiencies and create better connections with patients while removing regulatory barriers and constraints that inhibit entry into the workforce, impede care delivery and consume precious workforce time, energy and resources,” the group wrote.
WHA notes Medicare and Medicaid already make up nearly two-thirds of hospital revenues, and the growing portion of older Wisconsinites will continue to drive that trend. But the Medicaid program reimbursed Wisconsin hospitals 37% below the cost of providing care in 2023, while Medicare was 26% lower.
And while private health insurance reimbursement has previously helped to “bridge the shortfall,” WHA says insurance reimbursement has been lagging as costs rise for supplies, drugs and labor. The report also notes insurance premiums have been increasing faster than hospital prices — 6.7% versus 2.6% in 2023, respectively.
“This mismatch creates a confusing picture for employers who purchase health insurance for their workforce and for patients paying higher out-of-pocket costs, who attribute rising costs to hospitals, not to rising insurance premiums, co-pays and deductibles,” authors wrote.
Based on survey results from the WHA Information Center, hospitals employed about 88,000 workers across 18 patient care professions, which makes up about three-fourths of total hospital employment. This figure has grown by 8% since 2019, with gains across 13 of the professions tracked in the survey.
“The health care workforce continues to stabilize, but significant shortages remain—a status upgrade that could be reported this year as ‘serious, but stable,’” authors wrote.
See the report.
