Bringing together individuals and institutions devoted to health promotion and disease prevention to redefine how we educate the health professions workforce.
APTR joined 85 organizations, representing associations and specialty societies, to thank the House and Senate Leadership for investing in physician training by adding 1,000 new Medicare-supported graduate medical education (GME) positions in the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021. These slots are critical to helping ensure a workforce to care for patients and communities. The United States is facing a projected physician shortage of between 54,100 and 139,000 physicians by 2033, and the COVID-19 pandemic has only put more pressure on the physician workforce as physicians and providers have mobilized across the country to respond to this public health emergency.
Federal support for GME has been effectively frozen since 1997, and while the nation’s teaching hospitals continue to invest their own resources to train physicians over the cap, these new slots will alleviate some of the pressure they have been facing and allow them to increase training. The residency positions supported by the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 are a needed first step to train enough physicians to meet our growing and aging population. APTR is particularly pleased that additional steps were taken to prioritize training programs in rural areas and providers that care for underserved communities in the distribution of these new residency positions.
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