Medicare enrollees have so much less choice in Meds already. You might as well make the only meds available to Medicare recipients the $4 list at Walmart cause that’s basically what it will be if they try to ‘negotiate down’ prices.

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There are over 10000 more docs applying for residency than there are spots right now. Almost all the extra docs are foreign tho.

Hence my point about the American Medical Association chiming domestic supply.

Those days are over. That was true from 70’s to the 90’s, but no longer. The bigger issue is that many of the new schools cannot produce the same kind of experience the old ones did. The old schools all have large teaching hospitals, the new ones are sending their students to small community hospitals all over the state. It’s a very different experience. 

Either way, it doesn’t matter, the number of Domestic grads has increased dramatically to the point where we are very close to not having any slots for people from non-US medical schools. Something to point out is that not all foreign grads are actually foreign. The Caribbean has been a place for US students who couldn’t get into medical school stateside have gone to for years. Here’s some light reading about that: https://www.mdmag.com/medical-news/the-e...al-schools
Just as a public service announcement, if you have a kid or relative who wants to goto the Caribbean for med school, don’t let them. 

Anyway, if more physicians are really what the system needs, we will certainly have it within ten years. We have almost doubled the amount of physicians graduating basically the last 20 years. We already have ten times as many nurse practitioners and PAs graduating as we did 20 years ago, but I completely understand wanting to see a physician over a mid level as there are vast differences in training. But it takes a long time to produce physicians so it’s not something that happens overnight, and many physicians want to go to the same popular areas everyone else does, so distribution will not be equal.

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Yes, it's improvement, but it's Blaine Gabbert 2012 level improvement. - Pirkster

http://youtu.be/ouGM3NWpjxk The Home Hypnotist!

http://youtu.be/XQRFkn0Ly3A Media on the Brain Link!
 

Peyton must store oxygen in that forehead of his. No way I'd still be alive after all that choking.

 

Your thoughts on this topic are misguided, 1,000 spots in medical school or a residency program doesn't mean that there are only 1,000 qualified candidates. It means that qualified candidates cannot gain a spot in the program.

Here's a nice white paper on the topic if you're interested.

http://newcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/...or-Gap.pdf

Oh, I see. 

That article still suggested that we should lower the standard required to be a nurse or doctor--less training or candidates from countries with less training. I may have missed where the qualified candidates exceed the available spots but I didn't see that. I think allowing more qualified people is a good idea, but I question if there's enough qualified people to put a dent in the costs of doctors and nurses. 

I knew a guy who was very high up in Florida hospital, which had like 25 locations. He told me that in spite of the fact that they were encouraging their doctors to form independent organizations that would bill patients and insurance directly, the hospital's expenses were still mostly doctors' salaries and nurses' salaries. He said the mortgage, utilities, consumables, and equipment financing were a much smaller portion.

What is really unfair about this is, although all doctors and many nurses get a very generous hourly wage, most of them work more hours than they would like. The shortages are hurting their quality of life too, they just can't see it.

Well, employees with any company will account for a lot of the costs, but the problem is still the treatment more so than the employees. HandsomeRob gave their percentage of costs. One study showed that outpatient hospital care increased 25% while physicians increased only 6% (from 2007 to 2014). The same study showed that hospice care prices increased 42% versus 18% physician costs. Most studies show similar trends.

I'm not sure how much cheaper you think they'd get, either. You may be able to find foreign doctors to work cheaply, but I can't imagine American doctors would work for modest wages. Personally, I wouldn't want a doctor that only gets 65 - 80k (or similar).

I can't speak for other hospitals, but I am familiar with staffing for three of the bigger hospitals around Atlanta. I haven't seen them work nurses any more than they wanted to work. There was usually a 3-day (12 hour shifts) minimum work week but any more shifts were typically voluntary. All the nurses I know use the schedule as one of the biggest benefits to nursing. Doctors probably work too much but I don't know much about that.

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