Roles and responsibilities of the global specialist digital health workforce: analysis of global census data (Preprint)

Abstract

The Global Specialist Digital Health Workforce Census is the largest workforce survey of the specialist roles that support the development, use, management, and governance of health data, health information, health knowledge, and health technology.

The objective of this paper is to present the analysis of the roles and the functions reported by respondents in the 2023 Census.

The 2023 Census was deployed using Qualtrics® and was open between 1 July to 13 August 2023. A broad definition was provided to guide respondents about who is in the specialist digital health workforce. Anyone who self-identifies as being part of this workforce could undertake the survey. The data was analyzed using descriptive statistical analysis and thematic analysis of the functions respondents reported in their roles.

A total of 1,103 respondents completed the Census, with data reported about their demographic information and their roles. The majority of respondents live in Australia (870, 78.9%) or New Zealand (130, 11.8%), with most (56.3%) aged between 35-54 years and identifying as female (65.3%). The top four occupational specialties were Health informatics (179, 20.2%), Health information management (175, 19.8%), Health information technology (128, 14.4%), and Health librarianship (104, 11.7%). Nearly all (797, 90.0%) of participants identified as a Manager or Professional. Less than half (42.2%) had a formal qualification in a specialist digital health area and only a quarter (26.0%) held a credential in a digital health area. Whilst two-thirds (65.7%) reported undertaking professional development in the last year, most was self-directed activities, such as seeking information or consuming online content. Work undertaken by specialist digital health workers could be classified as either leadership, functional, occupational or technological.

Future specialist digital health workforce capability frameworks should include the aspects of leadership, function, occupation, and technology. This largely unqualified workforce is undertaking little formal professional development to upskill them to continue to support the safe delivery and management of health and care through the use of digital data and technology.

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