The Hindu Business Line : Demand seen for healthcare professionals

Bangalore June 20 By 2012, the Indian healthcare services sector is expected to be worth Rs 75,000 crore, 50 per cent of which would come from hospitals.

Qualified

The trend would demand 2,500 qualified top healthcare professionals to fit the roles of medical directors and nursing directors and more than 5,000 senior executives would be needed to administer the running of the hospitals, mainly as CEOs and CFOs.

Executives

Apart from this, the industry would need 10,000 mid-level executives to handle marketing, HR, IT, maintenance, billing and engineering in the hospitals taking the total industry requirement over 17,500, according to a study by EMA Partners, a global search firm, which undertook this study on demand for talent in hospitals in the country.

In fact, EMA Partners has set up a separate healthcare practice to cater to the HR needs of the industry.

Service industry

Commenting on the talent available for the industry in the country, Mr Krishna Prakash, Partner, EMA Partners, said that while for the generic functions, people from the service industry can be fitted out, it's filling the medical role vacancies that could pose a problem. "These skills are not readily available in the country, and we'll have to get people from abroad for these roles."

Pay packages

But the good news for the industry is that salaries in the US and Europe are stagnating and the trend of NRI doctors returning to India is catching up.

With growth in demand for medical professionals, there will be at least 10-15 per cent rise in the pay packages for medical professionals, said Mr Krishna Prakash.

"In the healthcare sector, it's not just numbers, but the number of trained or skilled professionals that are needed," said Mr Somnath Das, Chief Operating Officer of Manipal Cure and Care, a healthcare retail chain of the Manipal Group, which is launching 10 outlets this year.

Each of these outlets would require 70 trained professionals including doctors, nurses, counsellors, lab technicians and sales people.

Industry estimates show that the country would require over seven lakh beds by 2012 to meet the demands of patients, with the private sector adding over 1,200 hospitals by then.

More Stories on : Medical Institutions & Hospitals | Human Resources | Outlook

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