Lab Techs Are In Short Supply, Despite Recession

(MoneyWatch)  As if we didn't already have enough problems in health care, around half of all U.S. laboratories are having trouble finding qualified personnel. That's an important link in the system, and one that is rarely considered.

Previously, we heard about the shortage of nurses, and then about an undersupply of pharmacists--although both of those professions are relatively well-paid. Now a combination of factors is creating the same situation among lower-paid lab technicians and technologists. Those factors include the retirements of aging lab techs and the closing of medical technologist schools, partly because of funding cuts.

U.S. labs employ 309,000 clinical workers, including 145,890 medical technicians, who run simple diagnostic tests, and 163,270 medical technologists, who perform more complex tests. Technicians earn an average $17.36 an hour, or $36,110 a year. Technologists make $25.20 an hour, on average, or $52,410 a year. The latter require training comparable to that of a nurse, but earn less and have less chance of advancement.

One eye-opener is that hospitals employ 97,370 medical technologists, nearly 60 percent of the total; they also employ 64,300 technicians, or 44 percent. Neither reference labs, such as Quest and LabCorp, nor physician offices with their own labs are within hailing distance of hospitals, which clearly dominate the lab market. And this isn't just because of inpatient lab tests; hospitals get a big chunk of their revenues from doing tests ordered by outpatient physicians.

So what does it mean that labs can't fill open positions in a down labor market? Two things: First, unless more money is made available to train medical technologists (some is included in the stimulus package), we're going to have a real shortage. That would not only delay the completion of tests, but also hurt the bottom lines of labs and hospitals. And second, unless there's a public education campaign to raise the visibility of this occupation, there won't be anyone to train.