NHS Contract Job Trends in the West Midlands

National Health Service (NHS)
England > West Midlands

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term NHS in contract job vacancies in the West Midlands. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited NHS over the 6 months leading up to 24 February 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
24 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 140 71 80
Rank change year-on-year -69 +9 +5
Contract jobs citing NHS 13 27 29
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 0.48% 1.93% 1.53%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 1.50% 6.09% 4.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 11 6 12
10th Percentile £300 £110 £122
25th Percentile £353 £169 £228
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £400 £410 £345
Median % change year-on-year -2.44% +18.84% +51.98%
75th Percentile £470 £525 £425
90th Percentile - £594 £635
England median daily rate £425 £350 £280
% change year-on-year +21.43% +25.00% -2.45%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 10 13
10th Percentile - £15.22 -
25th Percentile - £16.67 £10.42
Median hourly rate - £18.13 £11.73
Median % change year-on-year - +54.63% -33.83%
75th Percentile - £22.89 £17.72
90th Percentile - £23.66 -
England median hourly rate £16.00 £23.60 £15.99
% change year-on-year -32.20% +47.64% -26.88%

All Generic Skills
West Midlands

NHS falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills in the West Midlands.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 867 443 649
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 32.28% 31.73% 34.25%
Number of daily rates quoted 516 272 406
10th Percentile £254 £200 £300
25th Percentile £400 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £500
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% +5.26%
75th Percentile £600 £620 £610
90th Percentile £675 £699 £688
England median daily rate £513 £545 £550
% change year-on-year -5.96% -0.91% -4.35%
Number of hourly rates quoted 30 22 56
10th Percentile £17.01 £15.36 £10.68
25th Percentile £18.50 £18.13 £14.71
Median hourly rate £25.08 £21.80 £22.75
Median % change year-on-year +15.05% -4.20% +18.60%
75th Percentile £27.16 £30.68 £40.44
90th Percentile £32.68 £53.08 £67.50
England median hourly rate £32.50 £37.00 £31.50
% change year-on-year -12.16% +17.46% +40.00%

NHS
Job Vacancy Trend in the West Midlands

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing NHS relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands.

NHS job vacancy trend in the West Midlands

NHS
Daily Rate Trend in the West Midlands

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing NHS.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing NHS

NHS
Daily Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing NHS in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 24 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for NHS in the West Midlands

NHS
Hourly Rate Trend in the West Midlands

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing NHS.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing NHS

NHS
Contract Job Locations in the West Midlands

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing NHS within the West Midlands region over the 6 months to 24 February 2026. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
Shropshire -41 4 £400 -
Birmingham -23 3 £350 -30.00% 13
NHS
England

NHS
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the West Midlands by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Applications
1 1 (7.69%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 2 (15.38%) AWS
1 2 (15.38%) Azure
2 1 (7.69%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 3 (23.08%) Firewall
2 2 (15.38%) DHCP
2 2 (15.38%) DNS
2 2 (15.38%) VPN
3 1 (7.69%) Network Security
3 1 (7.69%) VLAN
3 1 (7.69%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (38.46%) Electronic Patient Records
2 1 (7.69%) BusinessObjects
2 1 (7.69%) BusinessObjects XI
2 1 (7.69%) Crystal Reports
2 1 (7.69%) Data Warehouse
2 1 (7.69%) Power BI
2 1 (7.69%) SQL Server Reporting Services
General
1 10 (76.92%) Legal
2 9 (69.23%) Social Skills
3 6 (46.15%) Analytical Skills
3 6 (46.15%) Public Sector
4 5 (38.46%) Organisational Skills
5 1 (7.69%) Finance
Job Titles
1 6 (46.15%) Lead
2 2 (15.38%) Infrastructure Engineer
2 2 (15.38%) Project Manager
3 1 (7.69%) Analyst
3 1 (7.69%) Business Intelligence Lead
3 1 (7.69%) Consultant
3 1 (7.69%) Coordinator
3 1 (7.69%) Data Analyst
3 1 (7.69%) Healthcare Consultant
3 1 (7.69%) Lead Consultant
3 1 (7.69%) Network Engineer
3 1 (7.69%) Procurement Consultant
3 1 (7.69%) Project Coordinator
Miscellaneous
1 4 (30.77%) Analytical Mindset
1 4 (30.77%) Product Ownership
2 1 (7.69%) Data Structures
2 1 (7.69%) Management Information System
2 1 (7.69%) SystemC
Operating Systems
1 2 (15.38%) Windows
1 2 (15.38%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 4 (30.77%) Actionable Insight
1 4 (30.77%) Business Analysis
1 4 (30.77%) Programme Management
2 3 (23.08%) Problem-Solving
2 3 (23.08%) Project Management
3 2 (15.38%) Agile
3 2 (15.38%) Business Intelligence
3 2 (15.38%) Change Management
3 2 (15.38%) Data Analysis
3 2 (15.38%) Data Collection
3 2 (15.38%) Data-Driven Decision Making
3 2 (15.38%) Disaster Recovery
3 2 (15.38%) High Availability
3 2 (15.38%) Infrastructure Engineering
3 2 (15.38%) ITIL
3 2 (15.38%) Mentoring
3 2 (15.38%) Risk Management
3 2 (15.38%) Stakeholder Management
4 1 (7.69%) Performance Metrics
4 1 (7.69%) Security Patching
Programming Languages
1 2 (15.38%) Bash
1 2 (15.38%) PowerShell
2 1 (7.69%) SQL
Qualifications
1 1 (7.69%) CCNA
1 1 (7.69%) CCNP
1 1 (7.69%) Cisco Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (15.38%) Data Quality
2 1 (7.69%) Cyber Essentials
2 1 (7.69%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 1 (7.69%) SLA
System Software
1 2 (15.38%) Active Directory
1 2 (15.38%) Hyper-V
1 2 (15.38%) VMware Infrastructure
2 1 (7.69%) Firmware
Vendors
1 2 (15.38%) VMware
2 1 (7.69%) Aruba
2 1 (7.69%) CheckPoint
2 1 (7.69%) Cisco
2 1 (7.69%) Fortinet