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Following is a question by the Hon Joseph Lee and a written reply by the Secretary for Food and Health, Dr Ko Wing-man, in the Legislative Council today (October 28):
Question:
It is learnt that quite a number of nurses working in public hospitals are close to their retirement age, which has aroused concern about the shortage of nursing staff. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council whether it knows:
(1) among the nurses currently working in public hospitals, the number and percentage of those who will reach the retirement age in the coming five years, with a breakdown of the estimated number of nurses retiring each year by their rank and by the medical institution (public hospital/outpatient clinic) and specialty to which they belong;
(2) the estimated respective numbers of vacancies of various types of nursing posts under the Hospital Authority (HA) (i.e. enrolled nurses (general), enrolled nurses (psychiatric), registered nurses (general) and registered nurses (psychiatric)) in the coming five years, with a breakdown by rank and by the medical institution and specialty to which such posts belong;
(3) the estimated respective numbers of graduates from various types of nursing programmes in each of the coming five years, with a breakdown by course provider; whether HA has assessed if the annual number of graduates newly recruited is sufficient to fill the vacancies concerned; if HA has and the outcome is in the negative, how HA will resolve that problem;
(4) whether HA has considered improving the work arrangement, such as exempting nurses over the age of 55 from night shift duties, so as to retain talents; if so, whether HA has assessed the additional manpower it will need to recruit for the implementation of such a measure; if not, of the reasons for that; and
(5) given that HA is implementing the continuous night shift scheme to provide incentive allowance for nurses to undertake continuous night shift duties so as to reduce the frequency of their night duties, whether HA has assessed if such a measure is conducive to retaining talents; if HA has, of the details?
Reply:
President,
My reply to the various parts of the question raised by the Hon Joseph Lee on the manpower of public hospitals is as follows:
(1) From 2015-16 to 2019-20, a total of 1 051 full-time nurses in the Hospital Authority (HA) will reach the retirement age of 60, representing about 4.4% of the total number of nurses. The distribution of the above-mentioned retiring nurses by cluster is set out in Annex 1.
(2) Nursing vacancies mainly arise from natural wastages and the creation of additional posts for meeting new service demand. From 2012-13 to 2014-15, the overall turnover rate of nurses was maintained at 4.7% to 4.9%. The average turnover rates of general nurses and psychiatric nurses were about 5% and 2.8% respectively. The HA projected that there would be about 950 to 1 000 general nurse vacancies and about 70 to 80 psychiatric nurse vacancies generated by staff turnover in 2015-16.
As regards the additional nursing manpower required for delivering new services each year, the manpower requirements of the HA are projected by taking into account the estimated staff turnover, market supply, manpower requirement for new services and financial position. After formulating the manpower requirements according to its annual plan, the HA will make adjustments with regard to the supply and demand of nurses. Hence, figures on the specific manpower requirements cannot be provided at the moment. On the operational front, the HA will deploy nursing staff flexibly in the provision of existing and new healthcare services. As such, it cannot provide the estimated number of nursing vacancies in respect of individual healthcare service programme or specialty.
(3) The number of training places of pre-service nursing programmes for the five academic years from 2015-16 to 2019-20 is set out in Annex 2.
There is still a general shortage of healthcare manpower currently. The HA will continue to implement various measures through different means to increase nursing manpower and retain staff, with a view to relieving the manpower pressure. The measures include recruiting additional staff, improving promotion prospects, upgrading the proficiency of nursing graduates, providing more training opportunities, increasing the training subsidy provided for registered nurses, supporting the career development of enrolled nurses, enhancing the continuous night shift scheme and improving work arrangements. The HA will also update its projection of service demand and manpower requirements every two or three years.
There will be 367, 370, 395 and 400 nursing graduates from placement training in the respective years from 2015-16 to 2018-19. It is expected that the overall nursing manpower situation will be improved then. The HA will continue to monitor closely the manpower situation of nurses and make suitable arrangements in manpower planning and deployment to cope with service needs.
(4)and (5) The HA at this stage has no plan to exempt nurses aged over 55 from night shift duties. However, it has implemented the continuous night shift scheme which helps to reduce the frequency of night shifts. Nurses aged over 55 can benefit from the scheme. The continuous night shift scheme was implemented in May 1994 to improve the shift and rest periods of nurses. Since then, continuous efforts have been made to improve the night shift arrangement and the rate of allowance. The rate of allowance was further increased in 2015 to provide better compensation for nurses who undertake continuous night shift duties. Our aim is to reduce the frequency of night shift duties of nurses to not more than once in every seven days as far as practicable. In 2014-15, there were 1 897 nurses participating in the scheme. The HA will continue to consider different feasible options to improve the working environment and benefits of nurses.
Ends/Wednesday, October 28, 2015
Issued at HKT 17:21
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