Aging population provides job opportunities in health care field
By G. Jeffrey Aaron •jgaaron@gannett.com • January 14, 2011, 7:00 pm
Looking for work? The top five jobs in the Southern Tier over the next few years have one thing in common: serving the needs of an aging population.
Each of the following occupations is projected by the state Labor Department to be most in demand by 2018 in the Broome, Chemung and Tompkins county areas:
* Personal and home care aides. These jobs focus on assisting elderly or disabled adults with daily living activities at the person's home. Duties may include housekeeping tasks. The job has an average annual salary of $19,100.
* Network system and data analysts. Workers in these jobs analyze, design, test and evaluate network systems, such as Internet, intranet, and other data communications systems. Average annual salary of $57,180.
* Home health aides. These workers are required to have a higher certification than home care aides, according to Jim Silkworth, Vice President of Human Resources at Lourdes Hospital in Binghamton. While they are not registered nurses, they work under the direction of one, providing personal health care, such as bathing, dressing or grooming to elderly, convalescent, or disabled persons in the patient's home or in a residential care facility. The average annual salary for these positions is $24,380.
* Medical scientists. Workers in this field conduct research dealing with understanding of human diseases and the improvement of human health. They also engage in clinical investigation or other research. The average annual salary for these positions is $89,540.
* Medical equipment repair specialists. Workers in this field are responsible for testing, adjusting or repairing biomedical or electro medical equipment. Average annual salary is $39,490.
Another up-and-comer -- not in the top five of in-demand jobs but rising fast, labor market analysts and career planners say -- is the medical assisting field. Medical assisting combines administrative duties, like scheduling appointments and maintaining medical records, with clinical duties such as drawing blood, taking and recording vital signs or administering medicines as directed by a physician. The average annual salary is $24,500.The list of jobs is not as disparate as it might appear, said Christian Harris, an analyst with the Labor Department's Research and Statistics Division in Endicott.
Medical-based job options top the list because the region's aging population will require a higher level of medical care. And as healthcare institutions digitize their record keeping and billing operations and invest in new diagnostic equipment -- much of it computer-based -- the need for people to install, operate and repair the equipment will grow as well.
"We usually see computer-related and health care careers intermingled because our technology-driven economy is increasing efficiencies and taking the place of a lot of what used to be hands-on work," said Harris.
Eileen Head, undergraduate computer sciences program director at Binghamton University's Watson School of Engineering and Applied Science, agrees.
"Everything is going digital, it's all part of the green movement," she said.
But Head also warned that computer science undergoes a revolution every five years and what's hot today, such as the medical-based computer science tie-in, might be cold tomorrow.
"Every couple of years we have a student who goes through computer sciences and then goes to med school," she said. "But I would tell a student to get a four-year degree in order to get the fundamentals. If you have the fundamentals and they need you, then you can specialize."
Silkworth agrees that the aging population is driving the need for more health care workers.
"We need physical therapists, occupational therapists," Silkworth said. "Opportunities in nursing; that's a good field to get into."
He also sees growth in mid-level positions, such as physician assistants or nurse practitioners, and noted there are many entry-level jobs, too. Lourdes also offers tuition assistance and internal training opportunities, he said.
High need, low pay
While demand in the top five job categories is projected to be strong over the next seven years, the pay for two of the top five -- home care aides and home health aides -- is relatively low.
The Labor Department anticipates the number of available positions in the personal/home care field to grow by nearly 50 percent through 2018. But the median salary for these jobs is below $20,000.
The number of positions open in the home health care aide category is projected to grow by 31 percent by 2018, but it carries a median salary of $24,380, according to the Labor Department.
Both job categories require a minimal amount of training -- most of it provided by the hiring agencies -- and the low pay scale can lead to high turnover ratios.
Caregivers Inc., a national company with offices in Elmira and Ithaca, provides home health care and personal care services to its clients. Demand for those services is increasing, said Vera Sharpsteen, administrator at the Elmira office, as New York State's Health Department seeks to reduce the number of beds in its long-term care facilities and as people live longer.
Four years ago, she said, aides assigned from her office provided about 1,000 hours of care each week. The figure has now risen to about 1,700 hours. She's also noticed that a larger number of younger people are seeking employment.
"They are leaning toward the field because they hear that it is growing," Sharpsteen said.
The agency provides 24-hour care where it's needed, but Sharpsteen said her office is getting an increasing number of calls for two- to three-hour stints during the waking hours or at bedtime.
Her agency offers financial incentives to workers to retain them and the office administrators hold quarterly reviews to brainstorm ways to attract quality staffers."What we do is give incentives and bonuses, and the more work the aides do, the more incentives they are eligible for," Sharpsteen said. "We will pay them bonus money between clients and for working mothers; we are extremely flexible with the scheduling, which is a definite plus. We are also careful about placing the aides according to their skill level and their specialties, which helps create better matches and helps them form better relationships with the clients."
Another perk, she said, is offering vacation bonuses. Aides have the option of take a paid vacation or receive extra money and still work with clients.
"If another agency comes to town and one of our aides talks to us about leaving, we'll sit down and talk about wages and incentives they can get here. We are very flexible," she said.
Seeking job stability
The salaries for medical assistants -- just under $25,000 -- is only a little better than the pay earned by personal and home health care aides. But that has not affected the number of students who have enrolled in the medical assisting programs at Elmira Business Institute's Vestal and Elmira campuses.
"A lot of us who are Baby Boomers are aging and more doctors offices will need to open up to care for us, said Patricia Aukema, EBI's career services director. "More doctors are needed and more assistants will be needed. The medical field is also needing more research."
he state Labor Department numbers back up Aukema's observation: the medical assisting field is projected to see a 22 percent rate of growth through 2018.
Of the 450 students at the two Elmira Business Institute campuses, Aukema said, close to 80 percent are studying to become medical assistants. Because the job category does not experience the high turnover rates found in the other personal/home health care categories, those who choose to enter the medical assisting field are usually willing to accept a smaller paycheck, if it means more job stability.
"Sometimes, our incoming students ask about the wages, but what they are more concerned about is the fact that they will probably not be laid off," Aukema said. "A lot of them come to us from manufacturing and they want a stable job."
