Dive Brief:
- Although hospitals have primarily driven the spike in healthcare hiring over the past year, physician practices and outpatient facilities took the lead in February, Modern Healthcare reports.
- While an additional 10,600 hospital jobs were added last month, there were 23,600 jobs added among ambulatory healthcare settings.
- In total, the healthcare sector saw the addition of 38,100 jobs in February, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. That's an uptick from the 36,800 jobs added in January.
Dive Insight:
Hiring was up across all ambulatory subgroups except for medical and diagnostic labs.
Physician offices added 7,500 jobs, while home health agencies added 7,100.
Despite trends of consolidation and closures among hospitals, more than 181,000 jobs were added between February 2015 and February 2016.
The healthcare industry overall added more than 480,000 jobs over the past year. It is poised to become the largest U.S. job sector over the next three years, according to Politico's Dan Diamond.
The growth has its pluses and minuses for the economy and healthcare, experts note, as it raises concern about the cost of all those new jobs and what it means for the affordability of the ACA.