FAMILY MEDICINE MATCH RATE INCREASES FOR 5TH CONSECUTIVE YEAR

Forces Driving Student Interest in Primary Care

Why is the country seeing continued interest in primary care as a career choice? Blackwelder suggested that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) served not only as a vehicle for positive policy changes for primary care, but also as fodder for an abundance of news stories that have grabbed the public’s attention.

“There has been a lot of media attention about the need for more primary care physicians in the US health care system,” said Blackwelder, adding that the positive press likely had some impact on students.

Employment statistics related to family medicine also tell a powerful story. Data from national health care search and consulting firm Merritt Hawkins are clear; for 7 straight years, family physicians have been the most sought-after physicians in the country, said Blackwelder.

“It’s that kind of evidence that can influence medical students looking for the best career opportunity,” he noted.

As director of the Academy’s Medical Education Division, Stan Kozakowski, MD, spends a good deal of time with medical students on their campuses, and it’s not uncommon for him to encounter students in the clinical phase of their training who express surprise at family physicians’ scope of practice.

“Students often say to me, ‘I had no idea that family physicians could do all of that,’” he told AAFP News. “Or, students move through their clinical rotations, love them all and then suddenly, they realize that family medicine provides all of that variety.”

Kozakowski noted that family medicine interest groups (FMIGs)—supported on medical school campuses with funding from the AAFP—have helped create and maintain enthusiasm for family medicine, especially when medical students are given opportunities to rub elbows with family physicians at FMIG events.

“When medical students are exposed to family physicians who are passionate about their work, that passion is infectious,” said Kozakowski.

Payment Issues Continue to Challenge

All that said, payment for primary care services still is not on par with that of subspecialist physicians, a problem the AAFP continues to address through its advocacy efforts at the federal policy level.

“The most immediate way to get more students to go into family medicine is to increase payment for primary care,” said Blackwelder.

Provisions in the ACA, including a 10% Medicare incentive payment for services provided by primary care physicians, as well the establishment of demonstration projects like the Comprehensive Primary Care Initiative, are spurring progress on the primary care payment front.

Ditto for the ACA’s support of teaching health centers designed to train primary care physicians in community-based programs and the expansion of the National Health Service Corps. The latter provides scholarships and loan forgiveness for students who agree to provide primary care services in rural and other medically underserved areas.

“I’m encouraged by the changes we’ve seen in terms of policy and payment reform,” said Blackwelder. “Things are moving in the right direction, but we can’t let up, especially when it comes to helping alleviate student debt.

“Every advance we make in payment reform must be celebrated and then our efforts accelerated. We have to keep building on payment reform policies in order to attract medical students to family medicine because we need new family physicians to help build the primary care workforce that this country deserves.”