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Reports & Initiatives

Fewer and More Specialized: A New Assessment of Physician Supply in California

Kevin Grumbach, M.D., Arpita Chattopadhyay, Ph.D., and Andrew B. Bindman, M.D.

June 2009

This report presents the findings of the first comprehensive study of the Medical Board of California survey data on practicing physicians in the state. The data were used to enumerate, more accurately than had been done previously, M.D. patient care physicians actively practicing in California in 2008, for the state overall and by individual county. The results show that:

• The overall supply of M.D. physicians in the state is 17 percent lower than that estimated from American Medical Association (AMA) Physician Masterfile data.
• Of active patient care physicians in California, 34 percent were in primary care, which is 20 percent fewer than the estimate from AMA data.
• The number of primary care physicians actively practicing in California is at the very bottom range of, or below, the state's need based on Council on Graduate Medical Education estimates.
• There is an abundance of specialists practicing in the state, though geographically they are unevenly distributed.
• Rural counties suffer from low physician practice rates, and from a diminishing supply of primary care physicians.

The report also discusses a number of steps California policymakers might consider to address these problems, including: creating financial incentives and advocacy to encourage primary care physicians to practice in California and to modernize their practices, especially in underserved areas; increasing the number of new providers entering primary care and practicing in underserved areas by supporting specifically targeted training programs; investing in information technology to support systems improvements and connections across practices; and investing in the continued monitoring of the state’s health care workforce.

The complete report is available under Document Downloads, below, along with an Excel spreadsheet showing the number of physicians, by specialty, for each California county.

Document Downloads

Fewer and More Specialized: A New Assessment of Physician Supply in California (998K)

Active Patient Care Physicians in California by Specialty and County (145K)

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