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Rural Health
Resources by Topic: Physicians

Immigrant Doctors Can Help Lower Physician Shortages in Rural America
Report highlighting physician shortages in rural areas and exploring pathways by which immigrants come to practice in those areas. Provides recommendations for state and federal policies that would better incorporate immigrant doctors into the effort to ease healthcare shortages in rural areas. Includes statistics on the number and percentage of International Medical Graduates who were resident physicians in the United States in 2017, with breakdowns by citizenship or visa status.
Author(s): Silva Mathema
Date: 07/2019
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Center for American Progress
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Rural Surgery: The Road Less Traveled
Profile of a surgeon with an urban background who now practices in rural Oregon. Explores the challenges and the rewards of rural surgical practice.
Author(s): Keith J. Thomas
Citation: Bulletin of the American College of Surgeons, 104(7)
Date: 07/2019
Type: Document
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National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey: 2016 National Summary Tables
Provides data on outpatient visits to physician offices, with information on physician practice, patient, and visit characteristics. Tables 1, 13, 19, and 30 include data by metropolitan status for metro and nonmetro areas.
Date: 05/2019
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: National Center for Health Statistics
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Medicare Physician Payment Reform After Two Years: Examining MACRA Implementation and the Road Ahead
Provides a recording of a U.S. Senate Committee on Finance hearing on physician payment reforms under the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA). Features testimonies about what is working well and challenges faced, including provisions and challenges for small and rural practices. Contains testimonies from the American Medical Association, American Academy of Family Physicians, American College of Surgeons, American Medical Group Association, and Brookings Institution.
Additional links: American Medical Association Testimony, John Cullen Testimony, Scott Hines Testimony
Date: 05/2019
Type: Video/Multimedia
Sponsoring organization: Senate Committee on Finance
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Collaborative Models for Medication-Assisted Treatment: Key Elements of Vermont's Hub-and Spoke System
Describes the collaborative effort of three health-related organizations who partnered to develop and implement a medication assisted therapy (MAT) treatment practice using the hub and spoke model. This system was supported through a Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Health Home State Plan amendment for Vermont, a mostly rural state, to modify their current MAT services to increase access to addiction treatment, integrate health and addictions care, improve health outcomes, and promote recovery.
Date: 04/2019
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Medicaid Innovation Accelerator Program (IAP)
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Geographic Variation in Spatial Accessibility of U.S. Healthcare Providers
Examines spatial accessibility and other factors of accessibility for key physician and non-physician groups, including primary care physicians, specialists, nurse practitioners, and chiropractors in rural and urban locations, using geospatial methods. Population data, Medicare claims, provider location, professional school location, and U.S. Census ZIP Code Tabulation Areas (ZCTAs) were used in the analyses.
Author(s): Keith B. Naylor, Joshua Tooto, Olga Yakusheva, et al.
Citation: PLoS One, 14(4)
Date: 04/2019
Type: Document
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Buprenorphine Prescribing by Nurse Practitioners, Physician Assistants and Physicians After CARA 2016
Investigates the differences in buprenorphine prescribing patterns among nurse practitioners (NPs), physician assistants (PAs) and physicians in Medicaid following implementation of the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act (CARA) addressing opioid use disorder (OUD). Retail pharmacy claims from July 2017 to June 2018 were analyzed to identify prescriber type, number of patients, payer type, rural and urban differences, and Medicaid trends for FDA-approved buprenorphine drugs for the treatment of OUD.
Author(s): Rekha Varghese, Karin Johnson, Bo Feng, et al.
Date: 04/2019
Type: Document
Sponsoring organizations: IMPAQ International, LLC, Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission
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Rural Surgery Call Coverage: Innovative Locoregional Solutions Can Fill the Gap
Features rural locum tenens systems as possible templates to help provide call coverage for rural surgeons. Highlights a successful pilot Canadian Rural Locum Tenens Project and a collaboration with a surgical group in Ohio that helped provide surgical coverage for area rural hospitals.
Author(s): Stephen Hiscock, Michael Sarap
Citation: Bulletin of the American College of Surgeons, 104(4), 52-54
Date: 04/2019
Type: Document
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Primary Care Physician Characteristics Associated with Low Value Care Spending
Highlights study on the relationship between low value care (LVC) and the characteristics of primary care physicians. Looks at physicians' patient panel size, specialty, and region, among other characteristics.
Author(s): Tyler W. Barreto, Yoonkyung Chung, Peter Wingrove, et al.
Citation: Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine, 32(2), 218-225
Date: 03/2019
Type: Document
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MedPAC Report to the Congress: Medicare Payment Policy, 2019
Annual review of Medicare payment policies, with recommendations to Congress. Includes discussion on Medicare payment policies directly affecting rural providers and beneficiaries. Addresses opioids, Medicare Part D, Medicare Advantage, Medicare's quality incentive program for hospitals, and payment adequacy for healthcare facilities and services.
Date: 03/2019
Type: Document
Sponsoring organization: Medicare Payment Advisory Commission
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