In the News

WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Employers across the state, from small businesses to major hospitals, are telling us the same thing: They need more skilled workers.

Let’s take healthcare, for example, a field where worker shortages remain widespread and have far-reaching consequences for our most vulnerable populations.

In a recent report by the Center for Health Workforce Studies, over 94% of nursing homes reported challenges in recruiting Certified Nurse Assistants (CNAs) and home health aides in New York. Why? Because there simply aren’t enough trained workers.

Listen and View Article

Crain’s New York Business

One in 6 New Yorkers who needed dental care in the past year could not get it, according to a new study from SUNY Albany’s Center for Healthcare Workforce Studies.

That’s primarily because of the high cost of oral health care and widespread gaps in dental insurance coverage, according to the study, which analyzed state and national survey data from the American Association of Medical Colleges.

More than 11% of New Yorkers said they could not afford to go to the dentist. Roughly 10% lacked dental insurance, and of those who had coverage another 10% said they had trouble finding a dentist who accepted their plan.

Part of the problem is that private dental practices often do not accept Medicaid, forcing many low-income New Yorkers to seek care at overburdened safety net providers, explained Dr. Simona Surdu, co-director of SUNY Albany’s Oral Health Workforce Research Center and the lead researcher of the study…

Read Article

Dentistry Today

Oral health plays a critical role in a person’s overall health and well-being, yet many New Yorkers face limited access to the oral health services they need. Identifying where these needs are most acute can help guide resource allocation to fill service gaps.

A new report, released by the Center for Health Workforce Studies (CHWS) at the University at Albany’s College of Integrated Health Sciences, indicates that improving access to oral health services in New York State requires a broader understanding of oral health needs and the challenges that underserved populations face. The study, conducted by CHWS and funded by the Schuyler Center for Analysis and Advocacy, examined factors identified by New York State consumers that affected their access to oral health services and explored differences in utilization of those services by sociodemographic groups….

Read Article

McKnight’s Senior Living

Some of the fastest-growing occupations in New York between 2016 and 2026 are expected to be positions found in senior living communities and other healthcare settings, according to an annual report on trends in the healthcare workforce in New York.

“The Health Care Workforce in New York State: Trends in the Supply of and Demand for Health Care Workers,” from the Center for Health Workforce Studies at the University of Albany School of Public Health, reviewed healthcare employment trends in New York, identifies the healthcare professions and occupations in greatest demand and is meant to guide healthcare workforce policies, including decisions related to education and job training programs.

Read Full Article

Dentistry Today

Many of the factual points Dr. Michael Davis made in his August 19 article, “Dental Hygienists Face Temp Employment Difficulties,” are well taken. But I believe that the outlook for the dental hygiene profession, viewed holistically from the national perspective, is not as dire as depicted. In addition, respectfully, some of the language used to describe the challenges to dental hygienists is quite strong in the absence of citations…

…Dental support organizations (DSOs) also offer opportunities for dental hygienists that may not exist in a traditional dental hygiene position in a private practice dental office. They allow for career growth beyond clinical practice for those who want to pursue a role in administration, for example. According to the Oral Health Workforce Research Center at the SUNY Albany School of Public Health, DSOs are attractive to dental hygienists who desire employee benefits such as health insurance and retirement plans.

Read Full Article

DrBicuspid.com

The number of US pediatric dentists is expected to grow by more than 60% through 2030, according to new research commissioned by the American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry (AAPD). Without major policy shifts, this drastic increase in supply could overtake demand for services.

The dental industry is in a time of transition — more dentists are postponing retirement and an increasing number of students are enrolled in dental school. A study published in the July issue of the Journal of the American Dental Associatioexplored how these trends may affect pediatric dentistry (July 2019, Vol. 150:7, pp. 609-617).

Read Full Article

Buffalo.edu

More than 200 college students from underrepresented groups throughout New York State received a leg up in preparing for careers in medicine at the “Rx for Success: Preparing for Medical School” program held recently at the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at UB…

…According to data from the SUNY Albany Center for Health Workforce Studies, even in a diverse state like New York, where African-Americans and Hispanics/Latinos comprise more than 30 percent of the population, they make up only 12 percent of the physician workforce.

Read Full Article

City & State New York

New York City’s public hospitals, which form a critical safety net for many low-income residents, are facing a shortage of doctors who work in primary care, the day-to-day physicians with whom patients make first contact, such as those in family practice, pediatrics and internal medicine.

There is no shortage of primary care doctors in the state as a whole, according to a 2018 report from the Center for Health Workforce Studies at the University at Albany. But New York’s doctors are poorly distributed, with almost a third of the state’s population living in a federally designated health professional shortage area – including many in poorer areas of New York City, such as East New York, Brownsville and Washington Heights.

Read Full Article

McKnight’s Long-Term Care News

The demand for skilled care workers will grow by 13% through 2026, according to the most recent Bureau of Labor projections.

Overall, job growth in the healthcare sector is predicted to triple the pace seen in the rest of the nation’s economy.

Continued expansion will reflect “efforts to shift care to the community and out of hospitals,” reported Edward Salsberg, faculty member at the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services and School of Nursing, and Robert Martiniano, M.D., project lead at the Center for Health Workforce Studies. Hospital employment is projected to grow 7% the next decade. Conversely, home healthcare and practices are expected to grow most rapidly, by 54% and 21%, respectively, by 2026.

Read Full Article

LI Herald

Keeping up with demand for highly skilled nurses has not been easy for many hospitals, though. Long-term shortages have plagued the profession in the past, according to a 2016 study by the Center for Health Workforce Studies at the State University of New York at Albany. Demand is expected to become increasingly acute in the coming decades.

The first baby boomers turned 65 in 2011, according to the Centers for Disease Control. The baby-boom generation, born between 1946 and 1963, was, until the millennials, the largest generation in U.S. history. As of 2014, there were some 76.4 million boomers, according to the census.

Never before has the U.S. seen such a large generation of people growing older. On top of that, exponential advances in medical technology are expected to keep boomers alive longer than previous generations.

Read Full Article