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Is the December Health Care Employment Drop Just a Blip?

By Jim Knaub

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported last week that health care employment in the United States dropped this past December—for only the second month since 1990. The bursting of the speculative dot-com bubble couldn’t do it, nor the slowdown after the September 11, 2001 attacks. Even the subprime mortgage-driven Great Recession of 2008 couldn’t do the job, but last month it happened.

But one data point doesn’t make a trend, and it could represent just a blip on the chart—like this chart from BusinessInsider.com. Given that December was the month before the health care exchange provisions of the Affordable Care Act kicked in, it isn’t hard to think that health organizations may be skittish about the impending change.

Looking at trends localized to imaging, the American Society of Radiologic Technologists’ (ASRT) Radiologic Sciences Staffing and Workplace Survey 2013, which gathered its data this past August to September and was published in November, reflected a continuing softness in the technologist market. The 2013 survey (based on 1,145 responses) reported these findings:

• From 2003 to 2013, average radiography full-time equivalents (FTEs) per facility dropped 8.9%, from 10.1 to 9.2. Staff FTEs have increased in other modalities, including an average increase of two FTEs (from 3.4 to 5.4) in CT and four FTEs (from 0.9 to 4.9) for cardiovascular interventional technologists (CVITs).

• Vacancy rates (the mean vacant and recruiting FTEs divided by budgeted FTEs) declined in all modalities from 2003 to 2013. In 2003, mammography had the lowest rate at 7.2% and CVITs had the highest at 14.6%. By 2013, those rates had dropped in all modalities. CVITs still have the highest vacancy rate, but it has declined to 5.2%. All other modalities had vacancy rates at 3% or lower, with nuclear medicine having the lowest rate at 1.3%.

• There was a hiring freeze in 43.6% of facilities.

• For 2013, 35.6% of facilities reported that their operating budgets had been reduced, while 42% said their budgets stayed the same and 22.4% reported a budget increase.

Radiology managers have been dealing with the sluggish imaging economy since the Deficit Reduction Act cuts started to be felt in late 2007. The ASRT data suggest how those hard times affected technologist staffing and provide a glimpse at budgeting.

Whether December’s dip in overall health care jobs is a blip, a small trend based on the uncertainty and anxiety surrounding in health care reform, or something larger remains to be seen. It may take a little time, but ultimately patients entering the system from expanded health insurance rolls and aging baby boomers needing more care will drive health care employment upward.

— Jim Knaub is editor of Radiology Today.