The specialist-PCP imbalance

November 25, 2007

Would giving hospitals the same amount for every residency help?

“The distribution of resident training funds also should be reworked,” Dr. Weiner told amednews. “The government spends more to produce a surgeon than it does to train a family physician, because surgeons take longer to train and the government subsidizes each year of their salaries.” Weiner suggests that the government give programs a certain amount for each resident regardless of “whether they train for three years or seven,” noting that “this would create more equity between primary care and subspecialty residency programs.



Related posts:

  1. Universal health care and the physician shortage
  2. The PCP-specialist income gap
  3. Is general surgery the primary care of specialties?
  4. How work-hour restrictions harms resident surgeon training
  5. Dating a doctor
  6. "Education is not part of the cost of treating a patient"
  7. Loan repayment


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{ 2 comments }

1 Justin November 25, 2007 at 10:31 pm

I’m a 3rd year med student. I would jump at the opportunity to enter FM, move to a rural location, and setup shop….if I could get some money for my loans. A doc I rotated with got $25K a year loan subsidies for working FM in a small town about 20 years ago. Guess how much I can get thru the national health service corps today…$25K/year. It’s not enough for me. I’d rather take the job in the city. And I’d rather go into Anesthesia to more quickly get rid of my loans.

2 Anonymous November 26, 2007 at 10:03 am

justin if you know where you want to work, why don’t you talk to the community? they would likely work with you to help you defray costs in a similar fashion. primary care docs are hard to get. don’t be shy, most rural communities are desperate.

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