Why are healthcare professionals leaving NHS roles? A secondary analysis of routinely collected data

Much policy attention focuses on increasing the supply of workers in the English NHS but there has been less attention paid to the rise in leavers. This paper seeks to explore how existing data sets can illuminate the decision-making of leavers and inform actions that could mitigate this.

Secondary analysis of routinely collected data from 79 workforce projects in the UK (n = 46 339 participants) over a 4-year (2019-2023) period was undertaken. Free text data we extracted and analysed using content analysis, sentiment analysis and text mining. Inclusion criteria were those who stated they had resigned, had confirmed retirement date, and had secured employment elsewhere either within or without the sector but had not yet resigned. Exclusion criteria were those who had not indicated they were leaving or indicated intention to leave. These findings were then compared with themes from Herzberg's work hygiene theory and Hoffat and Woods's professional practice environment theory.

Multiple reasons were given for leaving. Findings were congruent with Herzberg's two factor work hygiene theory and demonstrate that leavers are driven by the inability to meet their intrinsic motivation to practice according to their professional standards as much as by terms and conditions. Leavers describe suboptimal professional practice environments which produce obstacles to achieving their work objectives and leaving their intrinsic motivation frustrated.

Whilst reasons for leaving differ between people, there is a relationship between intrinsic motivation (why they want to do the job) and the conditions in which they try to do the job. This study suggests that looking beyond the primary reason for leaving given in the national dataset could identify how the practice environment influences the decision.