Shortage of doctors

With the boomers aging, a shortage of doctors is the last thing this nation needs--- yet, this is what is expected to happen by 2020 (with 5 states demonstrating a very critical need) according to the Wall Street Journal article, Nevada Tops List of States At Risk for Doctor Shortages (as you can surmise from the title, Nevada tops the list of states most in need of family doctors).

We don’t know what the answer is but perhaps there should be (government) incentives for med students to go into family practice, instead of going into specialties (which pay more). Hey, there are incentives to join the military (college tuition paid, etc), why not offer incentives for med students to become family doctors, especially in the states that are in dire need of them? When there was a shortage of nurses (and we believe there still are in some states), there were incentives to join nursing school programs.

As one physician put it “Every day, we hear candidates for public office talk about the situation in Iraq or threats to our national security. Those are important discussions, but the number one concern of voters -- health care -- is being largely ignored. Candidates for public office owe it to the people …to tell us how they would fix our health-care system before it is too late, and voters owe it to themselves to question the candidates.”

We couldn’t agree more!