A new workforce projections study commissioned by Optometry Australia (OA) has been released, as the industry works to calculate the optimal supply of registered optometrists in Australia.
The peak body has launched the Optometry Workforce Projection Study report – undertaken by the Centre for the Business and Economics of Health (CBEH) at The University of Queensland (UQ) – that highlights a nuanced issue.
It shows that optometry is currently in oversupply nationally when compared to demand for eyecare services, or the number of people actually accessing optometry services.
But a stark gap exists between the number of optometrists currently practising and the number required if everyone accessed the services they needed (true population needs) as the sector works towards 2040 – especially when accounting for chronic disease burden, ageing demographics and inequities in access to care.
The authors noted Australia’s optometry workforce has grown substantially over the past decade, with registered optometrists increasing from 4,586 in 2012 to 7,405 in 2024. Despite this, significant geographic maldistribution persists, with most optometrists concentrated in metropolitan and large regional centres, reducing access to eye care for rural and remote communities.
The report forecasts the optimal supply of registered optometrists in the Australian workforce from 2025 to 2040, taking into account exit rates. And it provides key insights to support effective workforce planning and to ensure a robust workforce into the future.
Key findings reveal:
- Based on current service utilisation, there is an oversupply of optometrists and, if trends continue, a high surplus of optometrists will exist (between 2,831 and 3,348 and 6,514 optometrists in 2040 with 2% and 5.1% exit rates, respectively).
- If the rate at which optometrists are leaving the profession increases to just 10% – which isn’t unprecedented across other health professions – the gap between supply and demand narrows to almost reach equilibrium by 2040. (Note: the report cautions this approach underestimates the future demand for optometry services and subsequently overestimates a surplus within the workforce).
- Critically, if everyone who needed eyecare accessed the services they required, the current workforce would be unable to meet the populations’ full demand (a baseline of 9,010 optometrists to meet population need is identified for 2025, increasing to 11,479 optometrists in 2040).
- Further, if the average rate of optometrists leaving the profession is maintained, or increases to 10% by 2040, the shortfall of optometrists compared to population need is projected to be in the thousands (at a 2% exit rate, a shortfall is predicted in 2025, 2030 and 2035, but reaches an equilibrium by 2040; with a 5.1% exit rate, a shortfall of optometrists is forecasted at all time points; at 10% there will be a shortfall of 6,124 practitioners).
In their conclusion, the authors noted the population-needs model should be considered as the preferred approach to match the healthcare workforce to the needs of the population now and into the future.
OA CEO Ms Skye Cappuccio said the data highlighted a significant disparity between the current level of optometry service utilisation and the true population need for optometric care.
“Optometry Australia has a responsibility to the profession and to the community to work swiftly and strategically to ensure closer alignment between demand for services and population eyecare needs,” she said.
“Promoting the full scope of our profession’s skillset and ensuring everyone with eyecare needs accesses services is essential to closing this gap – this is how we ensure a robust, sustainable profession.”
She said OA’s new myopia awareness campaign and pre-election push to reinstate two-yearly billing for MBS item 10910, are part of this, but they are not enough.
“Alongside our work to enhance scope-of-practice and expand the settings across which optometrists are practising, we need a detailed understanding of demographics for whom the disparity between population need and service access are greatest. We also need targeted approaches to increase service access for each of these. Optometry Australia is convening a group of experts to spearhead this effort.”
Improving working conditions is critical to retention
OA said UQ’s workforce report highlighted the significant impact increased numbers of optometrists leaving the workforce would have on the ability to meet population need.
This means that if the profession does not improve workplace conditions for employee optometrists – an issue highlighted in a separate Flinders University survey recently – the sector risks undermining its ability to meet population eyecare needs over the next 15 years, the peak body stated.
“We’re calling on the sector to implement the recommendations of our position statement, and to ensure workplace practices that protect the integrity of clinical decision-making, promote optometrists’ well-being and facilitate fulfilling professional experiences,” Cappuccio said.
She said that while focusing on increasing service access to match population need is important, seeking to increase workforce supply before an increase in actual service utilisation would be detrimental to the profession and community.
She said that OA would continue to oppose approaches that would increase workforce supply in the short term, including new optometry programs, and at the same time recognised that future planning must begin early and strategically.
The maldistribution problem
Despite workforce oversupply, significant geographic maldistribution persists at the expense of regional, rural and remote communities, OA stated.
Cappuccio said this was not a simple issue of workforce size.
“This demands multi-pronged responses that overcome barriers to, and incentivise, working rurally and with populations that have reduced access to care,” she said.
“We have initiated a program of work to better understand what combination of approaches is likely to be most impactful. We are committed to facilitating informed conversation on this issue across the profession and more broadly and chasing change to support better workforce distribution.”
The full Optometry Workforce Projection Study report is available here.
Optometry Leaders’ Summit
OA recently convened the inaugural Optometry Leaders’ Summit where optometry’s most influential leaders, researchers, educators and changemakers met to explore solutions to sustaining a robust workforce that meets Australia’s eyecare needs.
It featured presentations by Flinders’ Professor Nicola Anstice and the CBEH team who laid bare a number of critical issues, including the lived experience of professional dissatisfaction among many employee optometrists and a significant unmet population need for optometric care.
They also discussed the workforce supply issue, outlined above.
“Our profession is not short on passion, purpose, or people who care deeply about the future of optometry – and the communities we serve,” said OA president Mr Theo Charalambous in his closing remarks.
“This summit’s discussions have brought further clarity to our plans, and will continue to support our work, but we need leadership, at every level to build a future that works for optometrists and for the people who rely on us.”
Cappuccio added: “Today’s discussion was important, but action is what counts. As leaders, we must accept a responsibility to act – together – to shape a thriving future for optometry.”
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