Projection of the availability of health professionals in Chile by the year 2020

Abstract

In recent years we have seen a global consensus around the current crisis of human resources for health and a growing agreement on the urgency of a collective effort to address some of the most pressing problems in this area. The aim of this study was to project the physician and nurses that would be able to practice in Chile to 2020 and contrast this scenario the demand for professionals who require the health system as standard and human development indicators. The analysis leads to the conclusion that according to international standards and experience and given the current first-year enrollment, retention rates, qualifications and professional immigration and professional factors in Chile to 2009 there is a great shortcoming of physicians per capita compared with the goals of WHO and the status of such countries. This gap will exist by 2020 if current rates above. To achieve the standards of countries with equivalent human development requires at least double the training of physicians in the country. Otherwise, if current rates above, the provision of nurses will exceed slightly what is required when Chile reach’s level of developed countries by 2020.