Below are activities conducted by the UW CHWS team that highlight the importance of the health workforce during the COVID-19 pandemic. Visit our Workforce Dashboard regularly to see the health workforce data that we are tracking during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Current COVID-19 Studies
- How Has the Pandemic Affected the Racial and Ethnic Diversity of the Health Workforce? Read more
- Employment and Economic Security Among Health Care Workers During the Evolution of the COVID-19 Pandemic Read more
- Career Mobility of Allied Health Workers During the Pandemic Read more
- What is Being Done to Prepare the Rural Health Workforce for COVID-19? Read more
- What Types of Changes in Employment Status Have Been Most Common Among Health Care Workers as a Result of the COVID-19 Emergency? Read more
- What Health Care Jobs and Skills are in Demand During COVID-19? Read more
- How are Allied Health Workers Being Deployed During COVID-19? Read more
- The Emergency Medical Services and Community Paramedic Workforces Response to COVID-19 Read more
Amid pandemic-high COVID-19 hospitalizations, health systems are using pandemic-response funds to hire travel nurses to fill gaps. This is a short-term fix, according to Sue Skillman, UW CHWS Senior Deputy Director. In a Kitsap Sun article, Skillman noted that there has been a reliance on travel staff across the healthcare industry to cover hard-to-fill staffing [...]
Director Bianca Frogner shares her personal fears about nursing home care and discusses ways by which these fears could be addressed through investment in nursing home staff in The Conversation published on April 13, 2021. She identifies the challenges that nursing homes face in maintaining a sufficient supply of staff such as certified nursing assistants [...]
In a MedPAGE Today Op-ed, UW CHWS Director Frogner and Senior Deputy Director Skillman discuss the staffing challenges that nursing homes continue to face during the pandemic and call for a COVID-19 sub task force to focus on these issues. Read the full op-ed here.
Director Bianca Frogner and Senior Deputy Director Sue Skillman discuss the importance of tracking unemployment among health care workers in the JAMA Health Forum published on November 8, 2020. They identify data barriers and potential solutions to tracking which workers are unemployed and the reasons why they are unemployed. Frogner and Skillman emphasize the need [...]
This updated brief shows the number of both initial and continuing unemployment claims in Washington State for categories of health care related occupations and select individual occupations through 10/10/2020.
Four exhibits show the rate of unemployment claims filed by health care workers from February to September 2020 based on monthly unemployment claims data from the Employment and Training Administration of the U.S. Department of Labor. State data points available upon request. Health Care Practitioners and Technical Occupations (SOC 29-0000) Chiropractors Dentists Dietitians and Nutritionists [...]
Nursing homes and primary care clinics have both struggled with staffing due to COVID. A Seattle Times investigative report detailed the long existing staffing challenges that have made nursing homes vulnerable during the COVID. Director Bianca Frogner commented on how the financing of nursing homes may affect staffing choices and thus contribute to turnover especially [...]
Updated maps through September 2020 available Four exhibits show the rate of unemployment claims filed by health care workers from February to July 2020 based on monthly unemployment claims data from the Employment and Training Administration of the U.S. Department of Labor. Health Care Practitioners and Technical Occupations (SOC 29-0000) Chiropractors Dentists Dietitians and Nutritionists [...]
This brief shows the number of both initial and continuing unemployment claims in Washington State for categories of health care related occupations and select individual occupations through 6/20/2020.
Director Bianca Frogner and Senior Deputy Director Sue Skillman co-author a Health Affairs blog post led by Dr. Alden Lai, Assistant Professor in Health Care Management at the New York University School of Global Public Health. Many states expanded scope-of-practice laws and regulations under emergency acts to meet demand for patient care brought about the [...]
Four exhibits show the rate of unemployment claims filed by health care workers from February to May 2020 based on monthly unemployment claims data from the Employment and Training Administration of the U.S. Department of Labor. We compared unemployment claims by health care workers with the number of health care workers employed using the Occupational [...]
This summary shows initial unemployment insurance claims in Washington State for specific health care related
occupations from March 8 through May 9, 2020.
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This brief shows the number of both initial and continuing unemployment claims in Washington State for 7 categories of health care related occupations through 5/23/2020.
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Four exhibits show the rate of unemployment claims filed by health care workers from February to April 2020 based on monthly unemployment claims data from the Employment and Training Administration of the U.S. Department of Labor. We compared unemployment claims by health care workers with the number of health care workers employed using the Occupational [...]
The COVID-19 pandemic highlights the tremendous sacrifice that Americans are willing to make to protect our most vulnerable people, including older adults and disabled individuals.
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This figure summarizes data on initial unemployment claims in Washington State for selected health occupations through 5/9/2020.
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This figure summarizes data on initial unemployment claims in Washington State for selected health occupations through 5/2/2020.
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This Rapid Response Brief includes descriptions of the supply, distribution, education pathways, as well as COVID-19 emergency concerns about the respiratory therapist workforce capacity and examples of state approaches to address workforce gaps.
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This figure summarizes data on initial unemployment claims in Washington State for selected health occupations through 4/25/2020.
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Director Bianca Frogner will be a keynote speaker during the Worker Memorial Day at the University of Washington on April 27, 2020, 11:30am-1pm to honor workers in King County, WA, who lost their lives on the job in 2019, as well as raising awareness about Occupational Health and Safety concerns for frontline workers during the current COVID-19 crisis.
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Research led by Director Bianca Frogner on the risk that home care workers face during the COVID-19 pandemic was cited by the Wall Street Journal.
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This figure summarizes data on initial unemployment claims in Washington State for selected health occupations through 4/18/2020.
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This summary shows initial unemployment insurance claims in Washington State for health care related occupations through 4/18/2020 as a percentage of total employment of each occupation in 5/2019. These data (download PDF) are from the Washington State Department of Employment Security (unemployment claims) and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Occupational Employment Survey (total employed [...]
This summary describes initial unemployment claims in Washington State for select health care related
occupations from 3/8/2020 through 4/18/2020.
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Four exhibits show the rate of unemployment claims filed by health care workers from January to March 2020 based on monthly unemployment claims data from the Employment and Training Administration of the U.S. Department of Labor.
Read More
In its 8th round of data collection, Washington’s Sentinel Network added questions to capture health workforce needs during COVID-19 pandemic. Preliminary findings from long term care facilities are now available.
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On May 6, 2020, Director Bianca Frogner is moderating an esteemed panel of health economists from around the globe to discuss health workforce strategies to effectively respond to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Director Bianca Frogner quoted by Vox on the need to include health care support staff in planning for personal protection equipment (PPE).
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This figure summarizes data on initial unemployment claims in Washington State for selected health occupations through 4/11/2020.
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The figure shows initial unemployment claims in Washington State for healthcare related occupations through 4/11/2020 as a percentage of total employment of each occupation in 5/2019.
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This summary compares weekly initial employment claims in Washington State for specific health-related occupations.
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Director Bianca Frogner interviewed by Medscape on the need to systematically track COVID-19 infections and deaths among health care workers. Read the complete article here!
This figure summarizes data on initial unemployment claims in Washington State for selected health occupations through 4/4/2020.
Read More
UW CHWS recently published a special edition of our regular newsletter detailing responses to COVID-19. Read the complete updates here!
Workforce strategies to help develop, deploy and replenish the health workforce during the COVID-19 pandemic are being compiled and posted by the Health Workforce Technical Assistance Center housed at the Center for Health Workforce Studies at State University of New York, Albany. This new resource will be updated regularly as the pandemic unfolds and includes [...]
Bianca K. Frogner, PhD, Director of the Center for Health Workforce Studies at the University of Washington (UW) joins six other directors of privately and publicly funded health workforce research centers to highlight state strategies to ensure and sustain the health workforce to meet patient needs during the COVID-19 pandemic. The article, “Ensuring and Sustaining [...]
Dr. Frogner joins Dr. Joanne Spetz, Associate Director of Research at Healthforce Center at UCSF, and professor at the Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies, Department of Family and Community Medicine, and the School of Nursing at UCSF in a panel discussion moderated by Dr. Patricia (Polly) Pittman, Director of the Mullan Institute [...]
[box title=””]Bianca K. Frogner, PhD Director of the Center for Health Workforce Studies Associate Professor, Department of Family Medicine School of Medicine at University of Washington bfrogner@uw.edu Suggested reference: Frogner BK. How many health care workers are at risk of being sacrificed to COVID-19 in the US?[Internet Blog] Center for Health Workforce Studies, University of [...]
