Lessons Learned from Workforce Diversity Tracker for Global Health

Through data collection and analysis, the Diversity Tracker can motivate and encourage professions, states, and schools to do more to address the underrepresentation of population groups among health professions.

Abstract

Health disparities experienced by subsets of the US population are similarly experienced in countries around the world, albeit not necessarily by racial or ethnic subsets of the population. The Health Workforce Diversity Tracker is effective in identifying baseline diversity data needed to address the health impact of these disparities and has four major components: (1) collection and analysis of data on the diversity of the health workforce; (2) dissemination of the data and findings; (3) support for research on the impact of interventions/strategies to increase diversity and; (4) advocacy through targeted distribution of the findings and convening of organizations.

A key component of the Diversity Tracker is the “Diversity Index” which is the ratio of the percentage of graduates (or practitioners) in a health profession compared to the percentage of individuals in the population of that race/ethnicity. This index allows for comparison of performance across diverse states and professions as well as over time.

Our findings indicate that regions and institutions may support their local workforce diversity efforts through modifying a similar model of monitoring and publicizing available data on health workforce.