Healthcare Workforce Consensus Report for an Aging Society Institute of Medicine of the National Aca

Grant Summary

The John A. Hartford Foundation, in partnership with other foundations, has funded an Institute of Medicine report to review the current state of knowledge about geriatrics health care workforce preparation and create a "blueprint" for geriatric care in the 21st century. In six years, the first of 75 million baby-boomers will reach age 65 yet there has been little comprehensive planning to develop and deploy the health professions workforce to provide high quality care to this burgeoning population. Funding for the Institute of Medicine report will be used to develop a national consensus study and report to characterize the optimal health care workforce for an aging America and will be disseminated to a broad audience. Consistent with a well developed consensus report process, the Institute of Medicine will impanel an ad hoc committee of 15 national experts from a variety of related fields. Their analysis will focus on the optimal deployment of human resources (both professional and non-professional), the best ways to train and retain those health care personnel in care of older persons, and the ways in which government health and education programs can provide incentives to promote the delivery of high quality care to the full health spectrum of the elderly American population. In the absence of major changes in health care delivery and workforce preparation, the rapidly growing older population's health care needs and costs of meeting those needs will precipitate a major national crisis. The basic structure of health care delivery has not changed in over a century, Medicare remains structurally the same since its inception despite changes in patient needs and system capacity, and the geriatric work force is insufficient due to payment inadequacies and insufficient incentives for pursuing geriatric training. This combines to form a bleak projection for the future of health care for the elderly.A nonprofit organization specifically created to provide science-based advice on matters of biomedical science, medicine, and health, the Institute of Medicine was chartered in 1970 as a component of the National Academy of Sciences. The highly respected, non-partisan Institute provides unbiased, evidence-based, and authoritative information and advice concerning health and science policy to policy makers, professionals, leaders in every sector of society, and the public at large. Since the 1980's, The John A. Hartford Foundation has been committed to increasing the nation"s capacity to provide effective, affordable health care to America's older population and views this report from such a highly regarded source as critical to addressing the future challenges of providing quality healthcare for the elderly.