80,000 additional healthcare staff to be available for employment in the NHS by 2020

General practice, emergency medicine, adult nursing and paramedics are just some of the key areas that have been identified as a priority in Health Education England’s (HEE) Commissioning and Investment Plan - 2016 17 which is published today.

The HEE Commissioning and Investment Plan - 2016/17 sets out the investment that HEE will make in its education and training programmes. It builds on the needs of local employers, commissioners and other stakeholders who as members of its Local Education Training Boards (LETBs), have shaped the thirteen local plans that are the bedrock of this plan.

The plan shows that:

• There will be 80,000 additional staff available to be employed by the NHS by 2020
• There will be more staff available to be employed in every one of the professions where we have commissioning responsibility by 2020
• the forecast increase in supply between 2015 and 2020 includes growth of nearly 15 per cent in nursing and midwifery and a similar figure for the number of doctors in general practice

Professor Ian Cumming, Chief Executive, Health Education England said:

We are training significantly more people to work in every healthcare profession than we anticipate retiring or leaving between now and 2020.

Between 2012 and 2016, we will have placed an additional 115,000 nursing and midwifery commissions into universities.

We are planning further, comprehensive national co-ordination of local planning for the major medical specialties and will have recommendations on these early next year for 2017, changes will be limited for now and focused on priority areas.