The Consulting Room: NHS workforce plans for eye care

This summer the NHS finally announced its long-term plan for the NHS workforce – something that had been long overdue. It includes major changes planned for the next eight years, such as:

• Doubling of medical school places to 15,000
per annum
• Reduction of medical school courses to four years
• Increasing GP training places by 50%
• Increase in adult nursing places by over 90%
• Apprentice style medical degrees for up to 2,000 students annually

We all hope the suggestions for retaining staff will make a real difference, but is it realistic to expect the staffing problems in the NHS to go away with these headline numbers? We might remember this is an NHS where there is a continual increase in demand and a perpetual shortage of staff to serve population healthcare needs. Demoralised staff are hard to retain and many prefer to work independently or retire early while the NHS hunts for staff abroad to fill gaps.