Medical workforce
Impact, regulation and health policy implications of physician migration in OECD countries
The importance of migration of doctors to OECD countries
Authors:
M.B. Forcier; A. Giuffrida; S. Simoens
Publisher:
Human Resources for Health, 2004
This paper, published in Human Resources for Health, examines the impact of physician migration on home and host countries – particularly countries in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) – and discusses international regulation and policy approaches governing physician migration. The authors find that OECD countries increasingly perceive immigration of foreign physicians as a way of sustaining their physician workforce. As a result, countries have entered into international agreements regulating physician migration, although their success has been limited due to the imposition of licensing requirements and the protection of vested interests by domestic physicians. OECD countries have therefore adopted specific policies designed to stimulate the immigration of foreign physicians, whilst minimising its negative impact on the home country.
The paper concludes that there is a need to create a global framework to enforce physician migration policies that benefit both the countries that migrants come from, and the countries where they end up working . In the long term, OECD countries need to put in place appropriate education and training policies rather than rely on physician migration to address their future needs.
