The U.S. clinician workforce grew faster than the administrative staff who support it from 2012 to 2025, according to an Ataraxis analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
Physicians and NPs combined grew 52.7% over that period. Support staff grew 36.5%, from 1.70 million to 2.33 million. The analysis counted medical secretaries, receptionists, medical records specialists, billing clerks, medical assistants and medical transcriptionists as support staff.
As a result, support staff per clinician fell 10.6%, from 1.97 to 1.76. The analysis said almost all of that drop came from NP growth. The ratio of support staff to physicians alone stayed essentially flat, according to the report.
“We added hundreds of thousands of new clinicians over the last decade but we never rebuilt the support staff underneath them,” said Ashleigh Atuahene, co-founder of Ataraxis and a former healthcare administrator. “When the support doesn’t keep pace, that work doesn’t disappear. It falls back on the clinician.”
The analysis said it does not measure burnout or prove that staffing levels cause it. It also said two of its support categories, receptionists and billing clerks, include workers outside healthcare.
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