Spread Thin Britain - Health Care Workers Increasingly Stretched

Spread Thin Britain - Health Care Workers Increasingly Stretched PR Newswire LONDON, September 4, 2012 LONDON, September 4, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- British health care professionals are working harder than they were one year ago according to research carried out by Randstad, the UK sector specialist recruiter. [1]In a survey of over 2,000 British employees , Randstad found that doctors, nurses and other health care professionals feel they are performing the job of 1.5 people meaning they are covering 50% more work than one person should be - the equivalent of two and a half additional work days every week. In contrast, British employees across all sectors feel they are performing the job of 1.3 employees - an additional day and a half. While just over a quarter (27%) of those in health care and nursing jobs feel their workload is suitable for one person, nearly a third (33%) feel that in an ideal world their role would need one full time and one part-time member of staff. 28% believe their role needs two full-time people to manage the level of work and 4% feel their role really needs at least two full-time members of staff as well as an additional part-time person. VickyShort, operations director of Randstad Care, said: "It's clear that public austerity measures are exerting more and more pressure on local authorities and the NHS to keep their workforces as lean as possible.