The authors endeavor to determine the right priorities for research on health personnel in the framework of the policies on science and technology of the countries in the Region. Although it is difficult to work out a common systematic approach for the analysis, definition and location of the infinity of variables that make up a health system, it is clear that the Region's ever evolving manpower situation has three effects that are ineluctably bound up with the socioeconomic development of the society served: the planning, education and training, and utilization of those resources. The article considers the lack of definite policies on just these three key elements in the development of health personnel and services in relation to both the supply of and demand for them. The authors point out that a genuine solution to the problems requires imperatively the satisfaction of the great need for high priority to serious and thorough research on the health care system, on mutual responsiveness between care services and training systems, and the economic, political and social aspects of the health field itself. The paper also considers the policy guidelines required by the research priorities, and identifies possible activities in the short and middle run for carrying forward programs and projects of social research in those subjects.