Tracking medical workforce trends

A feature in this edition of the Medical Independent reports on a HSE National Doctors Training and Planning (NDTP) medical workforce conference held recently in Dublin. At the meeting, two reports were launched: The Medical Workforce Report 2025–2026 and the Medical Recruitment and Retention Report 2025.

Each of these documents contains valuable information about how the medical workforce in the Irish health service has evolved over the past number of years.

The medical workforce report charts how the number of doctors in postgraduate medical training has been increasing. In 2025, the number of doctors in training was 6,063. This represented an increase of 7 per cent compared to 2024.

However, over the last five years, the rate of growth of non-training scheme doctors (NTSDs) has been higher than the growth of trainees – 9 per cent compared to 5 per cent.

The report showed that 40 per cent of NCHDs were in non-training posts. There is generally a low retention rate of this cohort in the HSE.

Although the number of NTSDs continues to expand, the rate has slowed.

The rate of expansion for 2023/2024 was 11 per cent compared to 2 per cent in 2024/2025.

There is “substantial variation” across the medical disciplines in the ratio of NTSDs per consultant. Emergency medicine, in particular, is very dependent on NTSDs. But the ratio of NTSDs to consultants in the specialty has decreased since 2022 – from 3.2 to 2.5 in 2025.

“This decrease is due to the increase in the number of emergency medicine consultants in recent years,” according to the report.

The document provides further data on the recent increase in consultant positions across the range of specialties.

It highlights that numbers have grown from 3,563 to 4,962 over the last five years.

“This growth has been faster than the growth in the population resulting in the number of consultants per 100,000 increasing from 71 to 90 over the same period,” Medical Director of the NDTP Prof Anthony O’Regan wrote in the report’s foreword.

In terms of recruitment, a particular challenge relates to model 3 hospitals. While these hospitals experienced an increase in consultant numbers last year, with a growth of 7 per cent, they continue to face high rates of temporary employment and have an older demographic of consultants.

Writing in the recruitment and retention report, Prof O’Regan noted how a large proportion of healthcare in Ireland is delivered through model 3 hospitals.

“The difficulty in attracting Irish trained doctors to work in model 3 hospitals may also result in reduced retention rates of graduates from higher specialist training,”
he outlined.

Another issue referenced by Prof O’Regan is the decline in new posts coming through the consultant applications advisory committee, combined with increasing numbers of doctors completing higher specialist training. This is “likely to impact on the retention of higher specialist trainees in the short and medium term”.

However, Prof O’Regan also pointed to positive trends in relation to retention of doctors who have completed higher specialist training.

Of the cohort who completed higher specialist training in 2016, 70 per cent were reported to be working in Ireland (in a public or private post) in 2025. Of the more recent 2021 cohort, 87 per cent were working in Ireland in 2025.

Prof O’Regan underlined that this has occurred in the context of large increases in the number of consultant posts.

The difficulties the Irish health service has faced in recent years in terms of recruitment and retention of doctors are well known.

In terms of recruitment,a particular challenge relates to model 3 hospitals

But it is important that granular data – such as that contained in these reports – continues to be produced in order to understand changing trends and inform workforce planning for the future.