Vision rehabilitation workforce in Italy: a country-level analysis

Area of Science:

• Ophthalmology
• Public Health
• Health Workforce Research

Background:

• Vision rehabilitation services have historically lacked adequate research and monitoring of their human resources.
• Understanding the vision rehabilitation workforce is essential for addressing service gaps and improving patient care.

Purpose of the Study:

• To provide an overview of the vision rehabilitation workforce in Italy.
• To profile the distribution and number of human resources dedicated to vision rehabilitation.

Main Methods:

• Utilized data from the Italian Ministry of Health's yearly reports on blindness prevention, education, and vision rehabilitation policies.
• Analyzed professional worker data in low vision rehabilitation centers from 2005 to 2019.
• Examined data on government-supported low vision centers' services and distribution.

Main Results:

• In 2019, the workforce comprised ophthalmologists (28%), orthoptists (31%), psychologists (19%), nurses (17%), and social workers (5%).
• Health workforce densities varied significantly across Italian regions (1.62 to 0.12 per 100,000).
• No growing trend in workforce density was observed from 2006 to 2015; workforce density showed a weak association with the number of centers but not with patient numbers.

Conclusions:

• Identified critical shortages in the vision rehabilitation workforce and deficiencies in data sources.
• Recommended increasing human resource development, improving data collection and analysis, and implementing structural enhancements.
• Highlighted the need for policy enhancements to meet national rehabilitation needs and serve as a model for other countries.