The health care sector is forecast to grow at a rate of 1% per year to 2014, which is slightly lower than in the1990s. The NHS, the single biggest employer in the health sector, accounting for around three quarters of the overall workforce, will need to recruit an additional 1000,000 staff by 2008 to meet government targets. The increase in staff numbers will be accompanied by changes in skill mix.

Clinical practitioners and scientists together with clinical and support staff constitute 80% of the workforce and around 20% work in management and administration. Among clinical practitioners nurses are the single biggest occupation, accounting for 30% of NHS staff.

In England, about 3 in 4 NHS staff are women. One in seven NHS staff are from an ethnic minority group and thus compares favourably to population figures. Yet there are issues of horizontal and vertical segregation in both groups.

Projections indicate that mangers and senior official and professionals are among the fastest growing major occupational groups within the health sector. But due to policy driven changes in skill mix health care assistants will take on more tasks from nurses and nurses more tasks from doctors as part of new extended roles.

Required high priority skills include: patient handling skills, management and leadership skills, team working skills, basic skills (numeracy and literacy) communication/language, IT and administrative skills, but also high level professional and specific skills.

Training in the health sector is more prominent than in other parts of the economy. However, there are also barriers to training, including staff shortages. Training will play a key role in modernising the NHS.

Employment in the health and social care sector is forecast to grow at a slightly higher rate in the Midlands and southern regions than in northern regions. Overall, recruitment and retention in the health sector is more problematic in London and the South East due to high costs of living and a buoyant labour market.

Research on the health sector is focused on recruitment and retention issues, including international recruitment, morale and job satisfaction, image of the NHS, skill mix issues and new job roles, and includes a number of cohort studies in certain occupations.