Who Does What

Most people are surprised to learn that of the 22 million healthcare workers in the US, less than 1 million are doctors. And only 34,000 are surgeons!

The largest group within healthcare workers are registered nurses with nearly 3.5 million in the US. Nurses spend the most time with patients and also take care of patients, so it makes sense that the system would need a lot of nurses.

The chart below illustrates the number of people employed in various functions directly related to patient care. Besides physicians, nearly all the other roles constitute some form of nursing or nursing without as much schooling or licensing requirements (i.e. nursing assistants or home health aides).