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City Press reports that the public health sector is bleeding older healthcare professional providers (HPPs), who are leaving the state to practice in the private sector.
But they aren’t staying too long in the private sector either, with many opting to deregister their practice numbers and hang up their white coats before they reach the age of 50. This is according to the Board of Healthcare Funders of Southern Africa’s latest report on the distribution of HPPs registered on the practice code numbering system (PCNS) during the period between January 2000 to December last year. For a healthcare provider to claim from a medical scheme they need to be registered on the PCNS. The report noted an increasing number of healthcare professionals registering on the PCNS, from 36,000 in 2000 to 54,800 last year, representing a 52% increase. This has greatly increased the proportion of HPPs per patient in the private sector. Surprisingly, however, this increase of professionals was in tandem with an increase in their average age in most disciplines. This unexpected observation was “worrying” to the report’s author, Charlton Murove; as he said it suggested that there had been an increase in the number of older professionals moving from state facilities to the private sector. The report noted a disproportionate number of HPPs practising in the private sector compared with the public sector, particularly in terms of geographical location and population needs. This disproportionate distribution was acute in more specialised disciplines.
- Read this detailed report by Vuyo Mkize in full at News24
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