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Rural Health
Resources by Topic: Physicians

Treating Rural America: The Last Doctor in Town
3 part documentary discussing challenges with accessing healthcare in rural communities. Part 1, "The Last Doctor in Town," highlights shortages of physicians in rural areas. Part 2, "The New Country Doctors," discusses rural residencies and the role of a rural physician. Part 3, "The Telehealth Solution," discusses the role of telehealth as a possible solution for barriers to care. Captions are available in the video player.
Additional links: The New Country Doctors, The Telehealth Solution
Author(s): Hyacinth Empinado
Date: 2023
Type: Video/Multimedia
Sponsoring organization: STAT
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Supporting and Sustaining the Current and Future Workforce to Care for People with Serious Illness: Proceedings of a Workshop (2023)
Summarizes discussions from an April 2023 public workshop exploring strategies and approaches to address major workforce challenges, including health professional well-being, workforce shortages, workforce training and retention, and advancing the diversity, equity, and inclusion of the workforce. Includes a section on well-being of the clinical workforce in rural areas.
Author(s): Roundtable on Quality Care for People with Serious Illness
Date: 2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Health and Medicine Division (HMD), National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
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Georgia Graduate Medical Education Exit Survey Report: Based on Responses to the 2023 GME Exit Survey
Report providing information on the experiences of physicians graduating from Georgia's graduate medical education programs, and the supply and demand of new physicians. Includes demographics, compensation and debt, retention rates, percent planning rural practice, assessments of the job market, and training experiences. Includes statistics on practice area demographics, with breakdowns by inner city, other area in major city, suburban, small city, and rural.
Date: 2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Georgia Board of Health Care Workforce
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Provision of Evaluation and Management Visits by Nurse Practitioners and Physician Assistants in the USA from 2013 to 2019: Cross-sectional Time Series Study
Evaluated healthcare visits of Medicare patients between 2013 and 2019 to determine trends in proportion of visits by a nurse practitioner or physician assistant versus a physician. Includes analyses of clinical setting, diagnosis, and various patient characteristics including rurality. Discusses workforce shortage impacts on the findings.
Author(s): Sadiq Y. Patel, David Auerbach, Haiden A. Huskamp, et al.
Citation: BMJ, 382, e073933
Date: 2023
Type: Document
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Disparities in Spatial Accessibility of Primary Care in Louisiana: From Physical to Virtual Accessibility
Evaluates both physical and virtual accessibility to primary care physicians (PCPs) across Louisiana. Analyzes disparities in access between rural and urban areas, the Black population and the general population, and for Area Deprivation Index (ADI) areas.
Author(s): Fahui Wang, Yutian Zeng, Lingbo Liu, Tracy Onega
Citation: Frontiers in Public Health, 11, 1154574
Date: 2023
Type: Document
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The Future Pediatric Subspecialty Physician Workforce: Meeting the Needs of Infants, Children, and Adolescents
Reports on barriers to increasing the pediatric subspecialist workforce and discusses the impact on research to improve health outcomes for children. Discusses access to care, education of the workforce, reimbursement rates, and more. Highlights rural specific challenges throughout.
Additional links: Read Online
Author(s): Board on Children, Youth, and Families
Date: 2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Health and Medicine Division (HMD), National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
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2023 Georgia Medical School Graduate Survey Report
Results of a survey designed to inform policymakers, medical school and graduate medical education administrators, and other agencies about the medical school pipeline, using data from Georgia's 5 medical schools. Provides insight on why medical students chose a specialty and residency site and how many intend to practice in Georgia when training is complete. Features statistics on percentages of students who intend to practice in rural and underserved areas.
Date: 2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Georgia Board of Health Care Workforce
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Rural Communities in the United States Face Persistent Disparities in Access to Orthopaedic Surgical Care
Examines trends in the proportion of orthopedic surgeons practicing in rural areas between 2013 to 2018 using data from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Physician Compare National Downloadable File (PC-NDF). Identifies the proportion of rural U.S. counties with access to orthopedic surgeons. Describes the characteristics associated with surgeons practicing in a rural setting.
Author(s): Victoria S. Wu, Jenna E. Schmidt, Tarun K. Jella, et al.
Citation: The Iowa Orthopaedic Journal, 431(1), 15-21
Date: 2023
Type: Document
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Quantifying Arizona's Primary Care Shortage Using Health Professional Shortage Area (HPSA) Data
Report describing the shortages of primary care physicians in Arizona. Data include shortages in both tribal nations and at a county-level.
Date: 2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Arizona Center for Rural Health
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Kentucky Physician Report 2022
Reports on the Kentucky primary care physician workforce distribution and shortages as of 2022. Features statistics on provider-to-population ratios and geographic distribution, with breakdowns by urban, rural, Delta, and Appalachian areas, and includes a county-level map showing numbers of physicians.
Author(s): Sydney P. Howard, Kaden Boots, Frances Feltner
Date: 2023
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: University of Kentucky Center of Excellence in Rural Health
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