Won't you stay just a little bit longer? A Discrete Choice Experiment of UK doctors’ preferences for delaying retirement

Introduction and aims: health systems around the world face difficulties retaining their workforce, which is exacerbated by the early retirement of experienced clinicians. This study aims to determine how to incentivise doctors to delay their retirement.

Methods: we used a discrete choice experiment to estimate the relative importance of job characteristics in doctors’ willingness to delay retirement, and the number of extra years they were willing to delay retirement when job characteristics improved. 2885 British Medical Association members aged between 50 and 70 years, registered with the General Medical Council, practising in Scotland (in December 2019), and who had not started to draw a pension were invited. We compared the preferences of hospital doctors (HDs) and general practitioners (GPs).

Results: the response rate was 27.4% (n = 788). The number of extra years expected to work was the most important job characteristic for both respondents, followed by work intensity for GPs, whereas working hours and on-call were more important for HDs. Personalised working conditions and pension taxation were the least important characteristics for both groups. Setting all characteristics to their BEST levels, GPs would be willing to delay retirement by 4 years and HDs by 7 years.

Conclusions: characteristics related to the job rather than pension could have the greatest impact on delaying retirement among clinicians.

Discrete choice experiment, Doctors, Retirement, Workforce retention

10.1016/j.healthpol.2021.11.004

0168-8510

Cleland, Jennifer Anne

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Porteous, Terry

26ca103a-8275-449e-af07-8bf4544eeb4b

Ejebu, Ourega-Zoé

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Ryan, Mandy

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Skåtun, Diane

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22 November 2021

Cleland, Jennifer Anne

f0403b18-256e-4517-966b-12f473355831

Porteous, Terry

26ca103a-8275-449e-af07-8bf4544eeb4b

Ejebu, Ourega-Zoé

4f545ae3-4823-44ab-8d59-185d30929ada

Ryan, Mandy

6a17e072-eddf-40b7-9f1a-49d58176d72e

Skåtun, Diane

783f6554-6fa5-4519-a358-6c9dbf7f424a

Cleland, Jennifer Anne, Porteous, Terry, Ejebu, Ourega-Zoé, Ryan, Mandy and Skåtun, Diane (2021) Won't you stay just a little bit longer? A Discrete Choice Experiment of UK doctors’ preferences for delaying retirement. Health Policy. (doi:10.1016/j.healthpol.2021.11.004).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Conclusions: characteristics related to the job rather than pension could have the greatest impact on delaying retirement among clinicians.

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Accepted/In Press date: 12 November 2021

e-pub ahead of print date: 22 November 2021

Published date: 22 November 2021

Additional Information: Funding Information: This study was funded by a grant from the University of Aberdeen Development Trust (UOA Ref: RG14022), and the qualitative data collection (reported separately) was supported by funding from BMA Scotland (UOA Ref: RG14434). Funding Information: The survey instrument and all available data can be obtained by contacting the corresponding author (JC). Our thanks to those friends and colleagues whose discussions about retirement, lifetime allowances and pensions ceilings were the motivation for this study. Thanks to all those who participated in qualitative interviews and in developing, piloting and completing the survey. Thanks also go to BMA Scotland for the distribution of invitations. This study was funded by a grant from the University of Aberdeen Development Trust (UOA Ref: RG14022), and the qualitative data collection (reported separately) was supported by funding from BMA Scotland (UOA Ref: RG14434). Not applicable. Approval for this study was granted by the College Ethics Review Board of the School of Life Sciences and Medicine at the University of Aberdeen (Ref: CERB/2018/12/1684), and by R&D departments of NHS Research Scotland in all Scottish Health Board Areas (IRAS: 238076). The study sponsor is the University of Aberdeen. Publisher Copyright: © 2021 Copyright: Copyright 2021 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.

Keywords: Discrete choice experiment, Doctors, Retirement, Workforce retention