Staff directly employed by the NHS: as at 31 March 2024
Data on medical, dental, nursing and midwifery staff, as at 31 March 2024.
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Introduction
This statistical release provides summary statistics on staff directly employed by NHS Wales and focusses on the number of full-time equivalent staff employed on the last day of the latest available quarter. The release includes analyses by staff group at Wales level. Data categorised by occupational code and NHS organisations are published on StatsWales.
The statistics are sourced from the NHS Electronic Staff Record, provided by Health Education and Improvement Wales. Staffing numbers are best measured by using full-time equivalent (FTE) data as FTE accounts for part-time working. One FTE is the equivalent of a person working the standard hours for their grade (usually 37.5 hours a week) and more detail is provided in the quality report. Overall headcount numbers are also published on StatsWales and are used for analysis of staff characteristics (StatsWales) in the annual statistical release.
Workforce data for primary care services such as general medical practitioners (GPs) (StatsWales) and NHS dental practitioners (StatsWales) are not included in this release and are published separately as they are independent NHS contractors.
Main points
Between 31 March 2023 and 31 March 2024, in terms of full-time equivalents (FTE):
- The total number of staff increased by 2,844 (3.0%) to 97,061
- Medical and dental staff increased by 336 (4.3%) to 8,250.
- Nursing, midwifery and health visiting staff increased by 1,597 (4.3%) to 38,820.
- Scientific, therapeutic and technical staff increased by 531 (3.2%) to 17,033.
- Administration and estates staff increased by 536 (2.3%) to 24,029.
- Ambulance staff decreased by 44 (1.5%) to 2,986.
- Healthcare assistants and other support staff decreased by 114 (1.9%) to 5,825.
- Other staff increased by 2 (1.4%) to 118.
The total staff headcount increased by 3,183 (2.9%) to 112,105.
Summary of staff directly employed
Figure 1: Number of full-time equivalent (FTE) staff directly employed by NHS Wales on 31 March, 2019 to 2024
Description of Figure 1: Line chart showing that the number of FTE staff has increased in every year since 2019.
Source: Electronic Staff Record, Health Education and Improvement Wales (HEIW)
NHS staff summary by staff group and year on StatsWales
The total number of FTE staff directly employed by the NHS has increased over the long-term with 21.2% more staff in March 2024 than there were in March 2019.
Figure 2: Number of full-time equivalent (FTE) staff directly employed by NHS Wales on 31 March 2023 and 2024, by staff group
Description of Figure 2: Bar chart showing that nursing, midwifery and health visiting group continues to be the largest staff group with 40% of the total workforce in March 2024. The number of FTE staff for all groups has increased since 31 March 2023, except for the healthcare assistants and other support staff, and ambulance staff groups.
Source: Electronic Staff Record, Health Education and Improvement Wales (HEIW)
NHS staff summary by staff group and year on StatsWales
The annual increase in total FTE staff between March 2023 and March 2024 was 3.0%. The change in the number of FTE staff varied from a 4.3% increase in the number of medical and dental staff, and nursing, midwifery and health visiting staff, to a decrease of 1.9% in the number of healthcare assistants and other support staff.
Quality and methodology information
The data is sourced from the NHS Electronic Staff Record provided by Health Education and Improvement Wales. Further information is available in the quality report.
The number of staff directly employed by the NHS has some seasonal patterns, linked to set times in the year when newly qualified staff can be recruited into permanent roles. As such, comparisons are made with the same quarter from the previous year.
The percentages in this release are rounded to the nearest 0.1. Percentage point changes are calculated based on the unrounded numbers.
Data on Sickness absence in the NHS and vacancies in NHS Wales are published on a quarterly basis. Note that there are minor differences in how staff groups are defined between the releases. These are detailed in the quality report.
Full details of quality issues identified with the data in recent years are provided in the quality report.
Statement of compliance with the Code of Practice for Statistics
Our statistical practice is regulated by the Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR). OSR sets the standards of trustworthiness, quality and value in the Code of Practice for Statistics that all producers of official statistics should adhere to.
All of our statistics are produced and published in accordance with a number of statements and protocols to enhance trustworthiness, quality and value. These are set out in the Welsh Government’s Statement of Compliance.
These official statistics demonstrate the standards expected around trustworthiness, quality and public value in the following ways.
Trustworthiness
A quarterly extract is downloaded from the Electronic Staff Record (ESR) Data Warehouse detailing all NHS staff in Wales on the ESR at the last day of the quarter. Data is submitted from Health Education and Improvement Wales (HEIW) on Excel spreadsheets via Objective Connect, a web-based tool to securely share and receive files.
The published figures are compiled by professional analysts using the latest available data and applying methods using their professional judgement and analytical skillset.
These statistics are pre-announced on the Statistics and Research area of the Welsh Government website. Access to the data during processing is restricted to those involved in the production of the statistics, quality assurance and for operational purposes. Pre-release access is restricted to eligible recipients in line with the Code of Practice (UK Statistics Authority).
Quality
Our statistics are produced to high professional standards and are produced free from any political interference.
Validation checks are performed by Welsh Government statisticians and queries referred to HEIW and other NHS organisations where necessary. Staff are grouped based on occupation code within ESR, and published data aligns the main groups referred to in the NHS Occupation Code Manual.
The statistical release is approved by senior statisticians before publication. Data is published in line with statement on confidentiality and data access each quarter.
As the ESR is a live system and data extracts are taken from it, data presented may be revised in future editions of the statistical release. Over recent years a number of quality issues have been identified with the data, some of which have been resolved. To help users to interpret the data and understand where those limitations may be; these are described more clearly in the quality report.
Value
The purpose of the statistical release is to inform users about staffing levels in NHS Wales. This information is published alongside data on sickness absence in the NHS and vacancies in NHS Wales to give a more complete picture of the staff directly employed by the NHS workforce.
Statistics are published quarterly with a three-month lag between the reference period of the latest statistics and publication. The statistics are published with brief analysis and commentary, in addition to open data format tables which are published on StatsWales. A more detailed statistical release is published for data on 30 September each year.
You are welcome to contact us directly with any comments about how we meet these standards. Alternatively, you can contact OSR by emailing regulation@statistics.gov.uk or via the OSR website.
Well-being of Future Generations Act (WFG)
The Well-being of Future Generations Act 2015 is about improving the social, economic, environmental and cultural wellbeing of Wales. The Act puts in place seven wellbeing goals for Wales. These are for a more equal, prosperous, resilient, healthier and globally responsible Wales, with cohesive communities and a vibrant culture and thriving Welsh language. Under section (10)(1) of the Act, the Welsh Ministers must (a) publish indicators (“national indicators”) that must be applied for the purpose of measuring progress towards the achievement of the wellbeing goals, and (b) lay a copy of the national indicators before Senedd Cymru. Under section 10(8) of the Well-being of Future Generations Act, where the Welsh Ministers revise the national indicators, they must as soon as reasonably practicable (a) publish the indicators as revised and (b) lay a copy of them before the Senedd. These national indicators were laid before the Senedd in 2021. The indicators laid on 14 December 2021 replace the set laid on 16 March 2016.
Information on the indicators, along with narratives for each of the wellbeing goals and associated technical information is available in the Wellbeing of Wales report.
Further information on the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015.
The statistics included in this release could also provide supporting narrative to the national indicators and be used by public services boards in relation to their local wellbeing assessments and local wellbeing plans.