Replies to LegCo questions
LCQ17: Hospital Authority manpower resources
Following is a question by the Hon Li Fung-ying and a written reply by the Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food, Dr York Chow, in the Legislative Council today (October 13):
Question:
It has been reported that 108 doctors and 80 registered nurses of the Hospital Authority (HA) left service in June and July this year. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council whether it knows:
(a) the breakdown of these healthcare workers by hospital as well as by grade and rank;
(b) if these healthcare workers departed under the Voluntary Early Retirement Scheme; if not, of their reasons for leaving office;
(c) if the workload and working hours of existing healthcare workers have been increased as a result of such manpower depletion; if so, of the measures to alleviate their work stress; and
(d) if HA has any recruitment plans in the near future to fill the vacancies?
Reply:
Madam President,
(a) Within the period of June and July 2004, a total of 95 doctors and 77 registered nurses left their service at the Hospital Authority (HA). Their reasons for departure include contract completion, termination, resignation, and normal / voluntary early retirement, as shown below -
Reason for Departure Number of Number of
Doctors Nurses
Contract Completion / Termination 57 2
Resignation 31 31
Normal / Voluntary Early Retirement 7 44
Total : 95 77
(b) The number of departed staff broken down by rank in the seven hospital clusters are shown in Annex 1.
(c) & (d)The HA conducts an annual manpower planning exercise, which encompasses among other things, a forecast of staff wastage and the drawing up of a recruitment plan for the following year. The objectives of this exercise are to ensure that the HA has the necessary manpower resources for handling the demand on public medical services and that the workload of its staff is kept within reasonable limits. At the beginning of this year, the HA has formulated a plan for the recruitment of doctors, nurses and other healthcare staff, taking into account relevant factors including staff wastage and the effects of voluntary early retirement. The HA has already brought in 291 new doctors so far, with ten more expected to commence work later this year. As for nurses, the HA has already hired over 300 new staff and will continue its efforts to recruit additional registered nurses. To alleviate the workload of frontline nursing staff in certain areas, the HA has retained over 200 undergraduate nursing students on temporary employment. The HA will also deploy more support staff to assist in simple patient care duties that do not require professional nursing knowledge.
Ends/Wednesday, October 13, 2004
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Legislative Council Q17
Annex 1
| HKE | HKW | KC | KE | KW | NTE | NTW | Total | |
| Doctors | ||||||||
| Consultant | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 6 | 1 | 1 | 9 |
| Associate Consultant /Senior Medical Officer | 2 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 7 |
| Resident/Medical Officer | 2 | 13 | 7 | 9 | 23 | 20 | 5 | 79 |
|
Total : |
4 | 16 | 8 | 10 | 30 | 21 | 6 | 95 |
| Nurses | ||||||||
| Department Manager/Senior Nursing Officer | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 5 |
| Ward Manager/Nursing Officer | 4 | 12 | 6 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 33 |
| Registered Nurse | 5 | 8 | 3 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 2 | 39 |
|
Total : |
9 | 20 | 10 | 7 | 12 | 13 | 6 | 77 |