W**n
发帖数: 51 | 1 http://medcitynews.com/2012/11/study-u-s-will-need-52000-more-f
Study: U.S. will need 52,000 more family docs by 2025
November 17, 2012 7:58 am by ANDREW M. SEAMAN
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - A growing and aging population, along with
increased access to health insurance, will create the need for 52,000 more
primary care doctors within the U.S. by the year 2025, according to a new
study.
The researchers wanted to estimate how many such doctors the U.S. healthcare
system would need after the passage of 2010's Affordable Care Act, which
will give an estimated 34 million more Americans access to health insurance.
But Dr. Winston Liaw, one of the study's authors, said the biggest need will
not come from more people having health insurance.
"A lot of the increase in utilization is going to be from population growth.
That's going to be the largest driver. Then, a smaller percentage is
actually going to be from insurance expansion," said Liaw, who was a fellow
at Washington's Robert Graham Center when the study was written.
Liaw and his colleagues, who published their findings in the Annals of
Family Medicine, used several databases to estimate how many primary care
doctors there are in the U.S., and how many people visit them.
They then used that information with additional data from the U.S. Census
Bureau to predict how many doctors would be needed as the population grew,
aged and gained access to health insurance.
In 2008, the researchers estimated that people made 462 million office
visits to primary care doctors. They estimate that number to grow to 565
million office visits by 2025.
That additional use, they say, will require a 3 percent increase in the
current primary doctor workforce, or an additional 52,000 doctors.
"That number is an expectation of how many we'll need in addition to how
many we have today," said Liaw, now at Virginia Commonwealth University in
Fairfax.
Of those, 33,000 doctors are needed to account for population growth, 10,000
for the aging population and more than 8,000 for increased insurance access.
"The fact that they made separate estimates for the increased demands for
primary care services that might be due to population growth on the one hand
, and aging of the population and thirdly the Affordable Care Act is a very
useful addition to this area," said Dr. John Rowe of the Columbia University
Mailman School of Public Health in New York.
DOCTOR SHORTAGE?
The study, however, cannot say whether or not there will be enough doctors
to handle the additional need, said Liaw.
For that, he added, they would have to also look at how many people are
expected to graduate from medical school and how many doctors will retire.
But some organizations have looked at those numbers, and are expecting a
severe doctor shortage in the coming years.
The Association of American Medical Colleges estimates that the U.S. will
face a shortage of 90,000 doctors by 2020, which will grow to a shortage of
more than 130,000 by 2025.
The Affordable Care Act, which puts a lot of focus on primary care doctors,
includes some provisions - such as offering additional money - to encourage
medical school students to become primary care doctors instead of
specialists, who tend to get paid more.
Those provisions, however, are only expected to provide 500 additional
doctors per year.
Rowe, who was not involved with the new research, told Reuters Health that
he found it "striking" that the authors neglected to address the potential
for non-physicians, such as nurse practitioners, to pick up some of the
extra workload.
In 2010, the Institute of Medicine issued a report saying nurses could take
on additional duties to take some of the strain off of the healthcare system
. (see Reuters story of October 5, 2012. http://reut.rs/WfvMcn)
In addition to not taking into account how nurses or physician assistants
may influence the numbers, the authors also warn that their estimates are
based on how many people visited primary care doctors in 2008.
"If things change, we could not account for that," said Liaw.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/XIQ26D Annals of Family Medicine, November/December 2012.
Copyright (2012) Thomson Reuters. | W**n
发帖数: 51 | 2 如果以上所述属实，对于考board的同学是不是颗定心丸啊？ | l*******d
发帖数: 449 | 3 没用，年年喊医生不够， 年年喊经费不足。时间长了，你就发现，他们是自相矛盾。
他们的目的就是：骗钱，减人，增收入。 | k*******0
发帖数: 355 | 4 good
healthcare
insurance.
【在 W**n 的大作中提到】
: http://medcitynews.com/2012/11/study-u-s-will-need-52000-more-f
: Study: U.S. will need 52,000 more family docs by 2025
: November 17, 2012 7:58 am by ANDREW M. SEAMAN
: NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - A growing and aging population, along with
: increased access to health insurance, will create the need for 52,000 more
: primary care doctors within the U.S. by the year 2025, according to a new
: study.
: The researchers wanted to estimate how many such doctors the U.S. healthcare
: system would need after the passage of 2010's Affordable Care Act, which
: will give an estimated 34 million more Americans access to health insurance.
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