§ Tim LoughtonTo ask the Secretary of State for Health how many hospital doctors have been(a) recruited and (b) left the NHS in England in each year since 1990. [7594]
§ Mr. Hutton[holding answer 15 October 2001]: The Department does not routinely collect data on the number of joiners and leavers from the medical and dental grades. The annual medical and dental workforce census contains details of individual doctors working in the national health service on 30 September each year. Figures are shown in the table.
Headcount of hospital medical staff, England at 30 September Headcount 1990 58,120 1991 58.700 1992 58,820 1993 59,720 1994 59,490 1995 62,720 1996 64,210 1997 66,840 1998 68,460 1999 70,000 2000 71,690 Source:
Department of Health medical workforce census
It is possible to link together files from consecutive years using the doctors' General Medical Council number, to see how many doctors are present one year and not the next, and vice versa. This provides a reliable general indication of turnover, which is used in workforce models, but does not provide reliable separate figures for leavers and joiners. The main reasons for this are:
Doctors do not receive full registration until they have completed their pre-registration year. For most doctors in the earlier stages of their careers, the census will show them with a limited registration GMC number in one year, and a completely different full registration number the following year. If we match these files together, the doctor would appear notionally as both a leaver and a joiner.Similarly, some doctors in the latter stages of their career take career breaks, or work for periods of time in other sectors such as the armed forces. The census only counts those doctors working on a given day (30 September), so again leaving and joining rates tend to be slightly inflated.