Saskatchewan Health continues to follow through on its commitment to ensure the province has the right number of health care workers to meet the needs of residents.

The province held a health human resource planning conference Tuesday in Regina, bringing together health partners to review progress of Saskatchewan’s Health Workforce Action Plan key goals, released in December 2005.

“This action plan sets the direction for a more integrated workforce and includes initiatives that are helping improve health workplaces and enhancing the education, training, recruitment and retention of health professionals,” Health Minister Len Taylor said. “During the past year, we have made substantial progress in putting into place many of the plan’s recommendations. This is about strengthening Saskatche-wan’s leadership in improving health care by helping us keep and attract key health care workers, which is a top priority of this government.”

Saskatchewan Health consulted extensively with its partners in the health system to help develop the plan and to implement the proposed actions. The plan reflects government’s commitment to:

· Recognizing and retaining the health professionals that Saskatchewan has and supporting them in the work they are doing;
· Improving our self-sufficiency in educating and training our own health professionals, within available resources;
· Recruiting from outside Saskatchewan to supplement our own supply; and
· Finding innovative ways to keep Saskatchewan youth in our province by providing them with training and employment opportunities in the health care field.
Since the plan was released, many new projects have been implemented. Some highlights include:
· Launching a provincial recruitment agency and website to help the province attract hard-to-recruit professionals and locate professionals in hard-to-recruit to areas. (www.healthcareersinsask.ca.);
· Announcing a $25 million fund to retain and recruit health professionals over the next three years. This commitment is in addition to the $75 million annually that the government commits to the recruitment, retention and training of health care workers, excluding physicians. As a result, the government will spend in excess of $250 million over three years, beginning in 2006;
Initiatives under this $25 million recruitment and retention fund include: A $6 million grant program (relocation; and northern, rural and hard-to-recruit);
A $6 million retention grant program for employees, employers and provincial organizations to develop and implement programs focused on keeping health providers; and
$500,000 to enhance clinical training opportunities.
· Hosting a western conference of Aboriginal health human resources – the first of its kind in Canada.
· Increasing by 56 the number of licensed practical nursing seats.
· Establishing a licensed practical nurse training program in the Kawakatoose First Nation.
· Providing funding to health partners to establish pilot projects focusing on effective staff mixes and professional development.Saskatchewan’s Health Workforce Action Plan will continue to set the course for future retention and recruitment initiatives in the province. The plan flows from the First Ministers’ Conference of 2004 and builds upon the province’s Action Plan for Saskatchewan Health Care.