Faculty Members Publish Predictions on U.S. Medical School Primary Care Outcomes

Faculty members, Emily Onello, MD and James Boulger, PhD with team member Patrick Bright, MA, are co-authors in a recent multi-collaboration study, Contributions of U.S. Medical Schools to Primary Care (2003-2014): Determining and Predicting Who Really Goes Into Primary Care, published in the Journal of Family Medicine suggesting that U.S. medical schools overestimate the number of graduates who will enter the primary care workforce.  

 

In partnership with members for the Rural Medical Educators (RME) Group of the National Rural Health Association and others, have discovered that U.S. medical schools overestimate the number of graduates who will enter the primary care workforce as physicians. In the study sample, the findings show that medical school graduates who matched into family medicine are much more likely to practice in a primary care setting when compared to the other primary care specialties of internal medicine or pediatrics. The publication also highlights the need for an adequate primary care physician workforce is felt to be an essential cornerstone of an effective and equitable healthcare system for our nation. For rural communities, the delivery of primary care is especially crucial due to the wide range of health issues and ages of citizens who live in more sparsely populated communities that are not likely to support the full-time practices of specialty physicians. 

 

Read the original publication here.