Health Professional Mobility in the European Union Study
EHMA has worked with the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies and nine other main partners on a major project on health professional mobility, which started in January 2009 and ended in December 2011.
The HEALTH PROMeTHEUS made a significant contribution to future thinking on the movement of health professionals in the European Union. PROMeTHEUS is funded through the Seventh Framework Research Programme of the European Commission (FP7).
First book online available!
HEALTH PROMeTHEUS, the flagship research project on health professional mobility coordinated by the European Health Management Association and co-financed by the European Community through the Seventh Framework Programme, sees the publication of its first volume entitled “Health professional mobility and health systems – Evidence from 17 European countries”.
Edited by Matthias Wismar, Claudia B. Maier, Irene A. Glinos, Gilles Dussault and Josep Figueras, and with contributions from many project partners and country correspondents, this book presents analysis undertaken in order to address gaps in the knowledge of the numbers, trends and impacts and of the policy responses to this dynamic situation. It provides a comprehensive analysis of mobility patterns, the impacts of migration on health systems and its relevance for policy-making and policy responses across Europe through 17 colourful case studies and additional in-depth analysis.
The book is available here to download (PDF, 6MB). For more information about the project, please contact Paul Giepmans (paul.giepmans@ehma.org).
Background
As labour markets become more interconnected, both globally and within the EU, health workforce policies at national level and the movement of professionals between countries are increasingly under the spotlight. The scale of professional mobility, the range of occupational cadres involved, the numbers seeking work in other sectors, and the potential impact on health systems as professionals move are all causes for concern. Making decisions on how to respond is difficult, however, given gaps in data, lack of knowledge of factors that reduce or facilitate movement, and evidence gaps on the effects on services, staff and financial and health outcomes beyond the anecdotal evidence.
HEALTH PROMeTHEUS, funded through the Seventh Framework Programme, contributes to this discussion by filling a substantial part of the knowledge gap on the magnitude and impact of health professionals moving to other countries. The study seeks to better understand existing patterns of professional mobility and the organizational, contextual and personal factors that push and pull health professionals across borders, to including the positive and negative impacts of mobility.. The project also aims to highlight feasible, effective policy interventions (national and international) and to identify effective managerial responses. In order to achieve these aims the study has included quantitative as well qualitative data analyses and research on trends and policies which aim to manage migration organizationally, nationally and internationally.
Overarching project objectives
Running until 2011, HEALTH PROMeTHEUS makes a significant contribution to future thinking on the movement of health professionals in the European Union. The expected results of the project are: (1) the promotion of networks: PROMeTHEUS will enhance cooperation between researchers in the field by connecting researchers and promoting the use of common conceptual frameworks and methodologies. (2) Proliferating excellence: the networking function will also help to of European research in the field through exchanging good practices. One of the key aims of the project is to (3) Support stronger policy making and policy responses to professional mobility in various ways. PROMeTHEUS seeks to clarify the need to respond to mobility and/or improve existing responses by mapping the magnitude of health professional mobility. Also, this research helps countries to better understand the underlying drivers of health professional mobility, and enhanced capacity of proactive policy and decision making will be achieved by providing qualitative and quantitative scenarios, based on the data collected by the mapping exercise and the analysis provided by the case studies.
By reviewing and assessing international and country responses PROMeTHEUS contributes to improving the quality of policy making in International Organizations, countries and health care organizations. This will be achieved by providing the most complete set of possible policy options, thus helping to identify the most adequate option currently available. In order to achieve the goal of supporting stronger policy making, early dissemination of (preliminary) research results has helped to improve the evidence base of the public debate as transferability and feasibility of different policy options were discussed at length. This will contribute to a more realistic perspective on what needs to be done and what can be achieved. All these elements will help Member States to better organize their health systems by seeing the issues in context; identifying drivers for health professional mobility and understanding when and how these drivers are amenable to change. In this way health care organizations and their management will be better able to address the challenges stemming from professional mobility.
Future work within the project will build on the milestones achieved so far. Work to be carried out in the second half of the project include a focus on effective policy responses at international, national and managerial level and aiming to translate scientific evidence and findings into actionable recommendations and model future scenarios of HPM. To ensure that the project is relevant to policy-making and practitioners, an advisory board of key experts and practitioners was established in early 2009 and has met twice to reflect on the project's progress. The project has also worked closely with two other FP7 projects on health mobility, RN4Cast and MoHPRof, to allow for added value of research findings.
Main findings
To be updated soon!
EHMA’s Role
EHMA has been responsible for the project management of HEALTH PROMeTHEUS and also delivered one of the work packages: ‘Testing the policy and managerial relevance’. The objective of this work package is to ensure that research and analysis throughout the project is fully informed by policymaking issues and practitioners’ concerns, and that it reflects a range of disciplines and national / regional level perspectives.
For more information, please contact Paul Giepmans.
Please also visit the HEALTH PROMeTHEUS website here.
A flyer providing more information on the project and its activities can be downloaded here.
The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Community's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreement n°223383. Sole responsibility lies with the authors and the European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.
