Increased individual workload for nuclear medicine physicians over the past years: 2008-2023 data from The Netherlands.

Abstract

Objecive: To investigate temporal trends in the individual workload of nuclear medicine physicians at a large tertiary care academic center between 2008 and 2023.

Methods: This study analyzed the reporting workload of nuclear medicine physicians in a large tertiary care academic center in The Netherlands on 36 unique (randomly sampled) calendar days, for each year between 2008 and 2023. The average daily departmental workload (measured with relative value units) was calculated for each year between 2008 and 2023. The individual workload was calculated by dividing the average daily departmental workload in each year by the available full-time equivalent nuclear medicine physicians in each year. Mann-Kendall tests were used to assess for any temporal monotonic trends in individual workload and types of nuclear medicine procedures performed.

Results: Individual workload increased significantly between 2008 and 2023 (Mann-Kendall tau of 0.611, P = 0.001). Individual workload in 2023 was 86% higher than in 2008. The use of positron emission tomography (PET) increased significantly (Mann-Kendall tau of 0.912, P < 0.001) between 2008 and 2023. The use of diagnostic scintigraphy decreased significantly in the same period (Mann-Kendall tau of -0.817, P < 0.001). The use of DEXA also showed a significant decrease (Mann-Kendall tau of -0.467, P = 0.013), but this decrease was negligible on a relative scale. The number of therapeutic procedures (Mann-Kendall tau of -0.100, P = 0.626) remained statistically stable in this period.

Conclusions: Our single-center study showed that the individual workload of nuclear medicine physicians has increased significantly between 2008 and 2023, driven by the rise in PET scans. The demand for both diagnostic and therapeutic nuclear medicine procedures and associated workload is expected to keep on increasing in the foreseeable future. This workload trend should be taken into account by policymakers involved in nuclear medicine staffing planning. A healthy balance between the nuclear medicine workforce and workload is necessary to maintain the quality of care, to be able to perform other important (academic) tasks such as research, educating and training medical students and residents, and management, and to prevent physician burnout and dropout.