Health Affairs

Posting date: February 4, 2004

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Health Affairs, 10.1377/hlthaff.w4.43
Copyright © 2004 by Project HOPE

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Prepaid Group Practice Staffing And U.S. Physician Supply: Lessons For Workforce Policy

Jonathan P. Weiner ^1*

¹ Jonathan Weiner is a professor and deputy director of the Health Services Research and Development Center, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, in Baltimore, Maryland.

^*Corresponding author.

Abstract

This paper describes staffing at eight large prepaid group practices (PGPs) serving more than eight million enrollees at Kaiser Permanente and two other health maintenance organizations (HMOs). Even after characteristics of the patient populations and outside referrals are accounted for, these PGPs have a physician-to-population ratio that is 22-37 percent below the national rate. Two decades of historical data at Kaiser Permanente indicate that its rate of specialist growth was far higher than that of primary care. The study suggests that efficient systems of care can readily meet the demands of patient populations with workforce staffing ratios below current U.S. levels.

Key Words: Physicians, Managed Care - Physicians, Managed Care, Workforce Issues

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This article has been cited by other articles:

				J. M. Colwill, J. M. Cultice, and R. L. Kruse Will Generalist Physician Supply Meet Demands Of An Increasing And Aging Population? Health Aff., May 1, 2008; 27(3): w232 - w241. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

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