Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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569. To ask the Minister for Health the progress to date in increasing the future supply of healthcare workers across all disciplines; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [31759/25]

Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
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Department of Health officials engage on an ongoing basis with colleagues in the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science (DFHERIS) and other relevant stakeholders to ensure that we train enough graduates with the skills necessary to support the delivery of health and social care services and to develop a strategic approach to workforce planning for the health sector.

Significant progress has been made working with the Higher Education Sector and Professional Bodies to increase student training places for the health sector. In September 2022 an agreement was secured with the Irish Medical Schools for an additional 200 Irish/EU medicine student places by 2026. Over the period 2014 to 2023 first-year nursing places in Irish Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) grew from 1,570 to approximately 2,100 – an increase of almost 34%.

Across 2023 and 2024 a total of 762 recurring additional student places in health-related disciplines were provided in Higher Education Institutes plus 389 additional student places in Northern Ireland across medicine, nursing, midwifery and allied health professions.

In July 2024, Government approved the prioritisation of funding to support the expansion of training places in priority healthcare areas including Speech and Language Therapy, Occupational Therapy and Physiotherapy. This will contribute to delivering expansion in the region of 35% in these vital disciplines over the next two academic years.

The Government this week approved a significant expansion in training places for Health and Social Care Professions (HSCPs), a move that will see up to 320 additional student places created in 2025 and a further 141 in subsequent years, in disciplines critical to disability, health, and education services. This immediate expansion will be in nine key HSCP areas: Physiotherapy, Occupational Therapy, Speech and Language Therapy, Radiation Therapy, Radiography, Podiatry, Social Work, Medical Science, and Dietetics.

Further work is underway with DFHERIS and other relevant Government Departments and the HEA to increase the number of student places across all health and social care professions.