Survey finds frustration among primary-care doctors

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BOSTON – A survey released last week by The Physicians’ Foundation has found what the group called “widespread frustration and concern” among primary-care physicians nationwide, including, in many cases, a desire to limit or shut down their practices.
The survey, one of the largest and most comprehensive physician surveys ever conducted in the United States, according to the foundation, aimed to give doctors a voice, “so that their thoughts, ideas and concerns might be better understood by policymakers, employers, insurance companies and the public at large,” the foundation said.
The survey was mailed to 270,000 primary-care doctors and more than 50,000 specialists – virtually every physician in active medical practice in the United States today, the foundation said. A total of 11,950 doctors responded, and more than 4,000 submitted written comments.
Key findings included:

  • 78 percent believe there is a shortage of primary-care doctors in the United States today.
  • 49 percent – which, if representative, would equate to 150,000 doctors nationwide – said that over the next three years they plan to reduce the number of patients they see or stop practicing entirely.
  • 94 percent said the time they devote to non-clinical paperwork in the last three years has increased, and 63 percent said that the same paperwork has caused them to spend less time per patient.
  • 82 percent said their practices would be “unsustainable” if proposed cuts to Medicare reimbursement – which were averted again this year, through Congress’s intervention – were made.
  • 60 percent would not recommend medicine as a career to young people.

    • “Going into this project we generally knew about the shortage of physicians; what we didn’t know is how much worse it could get over the next few years,” said Lou Goodman, president of the foundation. “The bottom line is that the person you’ve known as your family doctor could be getting ready to disappear – and there might not be a replacement.”

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    Founded in 2003 through a settlement of a class-action lawsuit by doctors and medical associations against private third-party payers, the Physicians’ Foundation seeks to advance the work of practicing physicians and to improve the quality of health care through grant-making and research for all Americans. The doctor survey was conducted May and July 2008 by physician search and consulting firm Merritt, Hawkins & Associates. To see the complete results or learn more about the foundation, visit www.physiciansfoundation.org.

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