Latvian Trade Union of Health and Social Care Workers (LVSADA) does not support the labour force development strategy project proposed by the Ministry of Health, says the trade union’s work coordinator Inga Rudzīte.
LVSADA notes the main problem with this strategy is that it ignores the role of pay, which basically takes away the trade union’s ability to improve public healthcare human resources.
In July 2023 LVSADA reminded the ministry that multiple previous attempts to use a similar document to improve human resources in public healthcare failed. In one case it was admitted by the ministry and in another, which took place in 2019, by the State Audit.
LVSADA stresses that the ministry’s report on “Human resources development in healthcare 2006-2015” programme mentioned that the established goal was not reached. The report also concluded that successful planning of human resources is possible only if estimates for pay maintains the established proportions between the average salary of a doctor, a medical practitioner and a patient care person (nurse, midwife, physician’s assistant) and a medical practitioner and a patient care support person (nurse’s assistant), and the monthly average salary of a doctor is calculated by a coefficient of 2.5 compared to the average salary in the country.
LVSADA notes that the last condition remains unaccomplished.
In 2024 the state guaranteed monthly wage amount for doctors and functional specialists is only 1.5 times bigger than the average pay amount in the country. In the first three quarters of 2023 it was EUR 1 512. The trade union had previously said that if the ministry refuses to ignore the aforementioned aspects, the strategy will not achieve the necessary result.
LVSADA concluded that the ministry has completely ignored evidence-based recommendations on enhancement of human resources.
As previously reported, the Ministry of Health is working on a healthcare labour force strategy. The plan provides for setting the welfare of workers was a priority.
The strategy sets directions for the development of human resources in the healthcare system. The ministry explains that this is a road map focused on a common goal – a safer, more efficient healthcare service that is provided by satisfied, highly valued and motivated workers.
The strategy provides for improving employers’ understanding of the role of the work environment in attracting and retaining workers, promoting the creation of an environment supportive of staff well-being in workplaces, reviewing the employment and motivation conditions for medical practitioners, promoting the attraction of motivated and development-oriented personnel in the public health sector.
The strategy also provides for ensuring human resource data accessibility in the unified information platform, improve data quality, promote data-based health human resource planning at the level of health care human resource development policy, create conditions for effective personnel planning in medical institutions, to strengthen administrative, methodological, research and scientific capacity in human resource planning and development, as well as to promote the provision of a quality health service by providing adequate human and financial resources.
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