PROVIDENCE – Rhode Island ranked as the second worst state in the nation for doctors to practice ahead of only New Jersey, according to a WalletHub report Tuesday.
WalletHub separated 16 metrics relevant to doctors’ employment into two categories: opportunity and competition (70 percent of the ranking), and medical environment (30 percent).
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Rhode Island ranked No. 45 for opportunity and competition. This ranking included metrics such as physicians’ average annual wage and average starting salary, hospitals per capita, the insured population rate, competition and the number of medical residents being added to the physician workforce of each state.
Rhode Island tied for the highest projected competition – measured by how many physicians there are per potential patients, with the more competition, the less good it is for doctors – by 2024, tied with Connecticut and Washington, D.C., according to WalletHub.
Rhode Island opportunity and competition individual metric rankings:
- Physicians’ average annual wage (adjusted for cost of living): No. 44 highest
- Physicians’ average starting monthly salary (adjusted for cost of living): No. 29 highest ($3,692)
- Most hospitals per 100 residents: No. 44 highest (2.75)
- Highest insured population rate: No. 10 highest (92 percent)
- Highest employer-based insurance rate: No. 18 highest (48.44 percent)
- Highest projected share of elderly population: No. 18 highest (21.38 percent)
- Current competition: No. 46 (higher competition means a lower ranking)
- Highest share of medical residents retained: No. 47 highest (30.4 percent)
Rhode Island ranked second to last for its medical environment rating, which accounted for the quality of a state’s public hospital system, the number of physician assistants per capita, malpractice award payout amount per capita, the punitiveness of the state medical board and the annual malpractice liability insurance rate.
Rhode Island medical environment metric rankings:
- The report noted that Rhode Island had the fourth-highest malpractice award payout amount per capita at $27.53.
- Rhode Island ranked No 25 in the nation for highest annual malpractice liability insurance rate at $15,881.
- The state had 0.28 physician assistants per 1,000 residents, which ranked No. 34 for most in the United States.
- Wallethub also said Rhode Island had the 32nd least-punitive state medical board in the nation.
Five of six New England states finished in the bottom half of the Best States to Practice Medicine WalletHub report overall. All New England rankings:
- Maine, No. 17
- Vermont, No. 34
- New Hampshire, No. 37
- Connecticut, No. 41
- Massachusetts, No. 46
- Rhode Island, No. 50
South Dakota was ranked No. 1 in the study, ranking No. 1 for medical environment and No. 3 for opportunity and competition. Idaho ranked No. 1 for opportunity and competition.
Chris Bergenheim is the PBN web editor.
