News/Commentary

Health care reform stories are everywhere—-but not this one.

How are you going to have health care reform if there are not enough doctors on the front lines to take care of patients? We have asked that question over and over, as have others who recognize the seriousness of the medical manpower shortage today and in the future.

This physician, who practices in California,  is saying the same thing. He is the very kind of doctor patients want. He is disenchanted.

The excerpt from the article quoted below is written by a practicing primary physician, who writes about a typical day—-which leads to why he cannot find a primary care doctor for himself and his wife.

This story is one that is being told to young people considering medicine.

Primary care may pay big in gratitude.

Primary care may save “the system” hundreds of thousands of dollars per physician.

Primary care is hard, long work for which a doctor is not properly paid.

CNN

• “Dr. Vance Harris: Health care reform assumes doctors will be available
• “He says primary care doctors are dropping out of the business
• “He says he saves the system big bucks but gets only small payments
• “Harris: My financial incentive is less than half what it was 20 years ago” (Emphasis added)

Dr. Harris writes:

“No one is talking about this on the national level. If they don’t address these issues, then good luck having physician assistants provide the safety net with two years of training. Good luck getting newly trained physicians once they see our salaries. Good luck finding internists in your community with only 1 percent of medical students going into internal medicine. (Emphasis added)

“Good luck recruiting primary care specialists when we are projected to be short 39,000 by 2020, according to the American Academy of Family Physicians. And nearly half of all doctors surveyed by the Physicians’ Foundation have said that over the next three years they plan to reduce the number of patients they see or stop practicing entirely.” (Emphasis added)

Source: CNN, August 25, 2009

Source: CNN editors note that an another version of this article appeared on SERMO.com, a private, physicians-only online community.