Pediatric rheumatology consultant workforce in Australia and New Zealand: the current state of play and challenges for the future

Abstract

Aim: There have been no formal assessments of current levels of the pediatric rheumatology workforce in Australia and New Zealand. Despite this it is felt that we fall well behind international guidelines placing children and adolescents with rheumatic diseases at risk of suboptimal care. Overcoming this shortfall in specialist pediatric rheumatology care requires documentation and recognition of the shortfall and a commitment from the health system to support improvements to supplement the current specialist workforce. The purpose of this survey was to assess the current state of play of the pediatric rheumatology workforce in Australia and New Zealand.

Methods: The Australian Paediatric Rheumatology Group (APRG) conducted a survey, which examined the current pediatric rheumatology workforce in Australia and New Zealand. The survey was sent via email link to a survey hosted by Zoomerang™ to 49 physicians known to treat patients with pediatric rheumatic diseases and they were asked to forward the survey to any others who they knew saw children with rheumatic disease.

Results: Currently there is a shortfall in the pediatric rheumatology workforce of 68% based on minimum requirements and a shortfall of 225% based on an ideal scenario.

Conclusion: Currently in Australia and New Zealand we fail to provide the level of care to children with pediatric rheumatic diseases comparable to other developed health economies worldwide. The current deficiency requires an increase in resource allocation to clinical service and speciality training to overcome this disparity and ensure children in Australia and New Zealand receive internationally recognized standards of care.

Keywords: australia; new zealand; paediatric rheumatology; workforce.