Unless healthcare employers are able to drastically improve their ability to recruit and retain allied healthcare workers, staffing issues will go from a huge problem to an outright crisis.
According to the 2025 NSI National Health Care Retention & RN Staffing Report, the annual employee turnover rate in hospitals in 2024 was 18.3%. For key allied healthcare positions, it was even higher. For example, the hospital turnover rate for certified nursing assistants was 36.1% and 34.2% for patient care technicians.
As baby boomers continue to age, it will become increasingly difficult to replace the employees leaving. Life expectancy in the United States is at an all-time high, and birth rate is at an all-time low, meaning by 2030, 1 in every 5 Americans will be 65 or older. Meanwhile, Mercer projected a net loss of 4.6 million workers in the United States healthcare industry between 2021 and 2026.
Retention has never been a more important issue for healthcare employers.
Education as a Recruiting Tool and Retention Driver
The good news is there’s a proven strategy for both attracting and keeping more healthcare workers – providing them with educational opportunities.
A 2025 WellSky survey of healthcare and non-healthcare workers found 74% of respondents said tuition reimbursement for current or future education was an important or very important benefit before deciding to apply or accept a job in the healthcare field. Meanwhile, in a 2025 Harris Poll of frontline healthcare employees, over 60% of respondents said they’d be more likely to stay with their employer if tuition assistance was provided.
The investment is mutually beneficial. Prospective and current employees are looking to continue their education to get promoted into higher-paying jobs. However, they often lack the financial resources needed to pay for educational opportunities. By subsidizing the training cost, employers are guaranteeing more job-ready workers for their most understaffed allied healthcare positions.
At the same time, by creating career pathways for employees, workers become more loyal and have a clearer picture of how their career can continue to grow long-term at your facility.
When the goal is sustainability, standing up a training program is often the most effective way to build a future-ready allied healthcare workforce.
How MedCerts Partner Solutions Can Help
MedCerts offers over 50 online certification training programs for high-demand allied healthcare and IT positions. For healthcare employers looking to start their own upskilling training program, partnering with MedCerts has delivered impactful and sustained results.
In the MedCerts Partner Solutions 2025 Allied Healthcare Staffing Survey, 93.6% of healthcare employers – who are also MedCerts partners – said that partnering with MedCerts on an upskilling or healthcare training program increased employee retention.
For example, when UnityPoint Health, a hospital network in Iowa, Illinois and Wisconsin, faced a shortage of medical assistants, they partnered with MedCerts to create a Medical Assistant Career Pathways program. Three cohorts, or 39 students, graduated the program within 14 weeks. A year after the program began, 97% of program participants still work at UnityPoint Health as medical assistants.
Additionally, completing a MedCerts program gives graduates a potential leg up on starting a healthcare-related degree. Seven universities are MedCerts Academic Partners who grant MedCerts students Credit for Prior Learning (CPL) towards a bachelor’s or associate’s degree. MedCerts programs can transfer into as many as 17 credits when relevant. By turning industry certification and prior learning into college credit, CPL helps learners avoid repeating courses – shaving time and cost off a degree while accelerating career advancement.
Conclusion
In the 2025 Allied Healthcare Staffing Survey, when MedCerts asked healthcare employers about their top priorities for strengthening their workforce over the next year, 36.97% cited reducing turnover, making it the top issue.
Retention is a huge concern around allied healthcare staffing, but through investing in upskilling, healthcare employers can create a more sustainable and loyal workforce.
Want more information about how partnering with MedCerts can address employee retention? Contact us at [email protected]!
