SINGAPORE - Come December, administrative staff joining the healthcare sector can look forward to structured training programmes that help them get up to speed with their new job.
Senior Minister of State for Health Amy Khor said this during a visit to Tan Tock Seng Hospital's Centre for Geriatric Medicine on Friday (Nov 17).
Dr Khor also said that there will be about 200 vacancies for administrative staff from now until the end of next year.
The training given to new hires now is ad hoc, with some assigned to a mentor, she noted.
However, new employees need to familiarise themselves with terms used in the healthcare sector or clinical terms used by doctors, while those in patient services must know the many schemes available, said Dr Khor.
The structured courses will allow new employees not only to get to know these quickly but also to learn about key healthcare trends, among other things.
For a start, the courses will be for those in finance, human resource and operations. Each course, which comprises classroom lessons and an on-the-job training component, lasts between three and six months.
Said Dr Khor: "Such structured training programmes don't only help the newly hired staff transition (to new job)... but also help to mitigate their concerns about joining the healthcare sector."
The training programmes are being jointly developed by Singapore's public healthcare clusters - Singapore Health Services, National Healthcare Group and National University Health System, and the Employment and Employability Institute (e2i). They will eventually cover other job areas, Dr Khor said.
The Ministry of Health said last year that it needed 30,000 healthcare workers by 2020, one third of whom are for the eldercare sector alone. Of these 10,000 vacancies, more than one-third are for professional, managerial, executive and technical staff, such as doctors, nurses, facility managers and administrative staff.
More details on the structured training programmes will be available at Workforce Singapore's Adapt and Grow Career Fair to be held at the Lifelong Learning Institute at Paya Lebar on Nov 28. More information about the fair can be found on https://www.adaptandgrow.events
