Health human resources planning and the production of health

The requirements for human resources in the future is shown to depend on four elements: the size and demographic mix of the population (demography), the levels of risks to health and morbidity in the population (epidemiology), the services deemed appropriate to address the levels of risks to health and morbidity (standards of care), and the rate of service delivery by providers (productivity). [...] The focus of this paper is to develop existing HHR frameworks in order to relax the strict assumptions about epidemiology and production embodied in current practice of HHRP in order to accommodate changes in the levels and distribution of health care needs in the population and changes in levels of productivity of health care providers. [...] Supply can be seen as the ‘outcome’ of two determinants; • The stock of individuals Mij, representing the number of providers in each age and sex group who are potentially available to provide health care services, and • the flow of activities, Ls ij, generated from the stock, representing the quantity of input (e.g., time spent in the production of services). [...] The purpose of this approach is not to predict the future but to integrate knowledge of different components of the conceptual model in order to improve understanding of the dynamics of the system and analyse strategies and policies to address human resource problems. [...] Because the rates of entry and exit generally differ depending on age, the size and characteristics of the future stock is a function of the initial age distribution of the stock.