Welcome To The Doctor Shortage
Welcome To The Doctor Shortage
What do you think...do you want to spend years and countless thousands of dollars going to med school, and then more sleepless years doing your medical residency, if, on the other end, the pay will be peanuts (but the malpractice insurance sure won't)?
Herbert Pardez, president and CEO of NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, writes in the WSJ about how we're about to "reform" ourselves right out of doctors -- especially the primary care kind:
The fundamental reason why medical students are not entering primary care on their own is that they can't afford it. Medical-school tuition can cost a student as much as $50,000 a year. Some doctors start out owing hundreds of thousands of dollars before they are even able to open a practice. Going to medical school is a little like taking out a mortgage, only without getting a house in return.Once doctors do start treating patients, they are squeezed between what they earn from government programs and insurance companies on one side and escalating malpractice insurance rates on the other. Meanwhile, specialists can often charge more and pay less in other costs than primary-care doctors. The reality is that many physicians cannot afford to go into primary care.
To address the shortage of doctors and the incentives that compel young doctors to eschew primary care, Congress needs to think about how to increase doctor pay, institute malpractice reform, and provide subsidies to reduce the amount of debt doctors have to take on. Residency caps should also be raised so teaching hospitals can train more doctors. Without these actions new doctors would be foolish to enter primary care...
Newsflash to anybody who slept through a little thing called the U.S.S.R. -- socialism is irrational. Few people are going to work like hell if they make little money on the other end (like the $30/hr. I believe my old boyfriend makes for Medicare liver transplant jobs). Few people smart enough to be your doctor.
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Stumble It!
Education should be made free so that people do not have to pay through their nose for it. Just have a small number of available seats so that only good quality people get it. Or even better, just remove college. in most cases, college education is useless – the only thing it does is provide employment to profs…so hiring should be done right out of school. After all, people pick up everything at work and forget everything that is taught in college.