Mapping the Current Demand and Supply of Dermatologists and General Practitioners Managing Skin Cancer in Queensland, Australia

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: The rising incidence of skin cancer places a significant burden on Australia's health workforce. To support workforce planning, we estimated the supply of dermatologists and general practitioners (GP) working in skin cancer medicine, service demand and need across Queensland in 2023. METHODS: We built a supply-, demand- and needs-based health workforce model using publicly available data. We collated data on the numbers of clinicians and clinical full-time equivalents (FTE), Medicare-reported skin cancer services and melanoma incidence. We quantified health workforce supply and clinical workload, clinical FTE per 100,000 population, number of Medicare claims for skin cancer services per clinical FTE and incident cases of melanoma per clinical FTE for all of Queensland and across 19 Level 4 Statistical Areas. RESULTS: Queensland had 7179 GPs (852 adjusted FTE) and 124 (71 adjusted FTE) dermatologists servicing 5,527,369 residents, with an estimated 17 FTE skin cancer clinicians per 100,000 population. Ten (53%) SA4 areas had no dermatologists, with none residing in central or western Queensland. Seven of the nine SA4 levels with dermatologists were in southeast Queensland (78%), and 47% of all FTE dermatologists practised in Brisbane Inner City. GPs were well distributed relative to population size. CONCLUSIONS: Access to dermatology services is limited for Queensland residents living outside the southeast region, with few providers available within reasonable proximity. GPs are managing a growing skin cancer workload in Queensland. This could be eased by increased use of telemedicine, upskilling other health professionals in skin cancer medicine and improving care efficiency.