The expansion of integrated behavioral health (IBH) in primary care is crucial to addressing the growing behavioral health crisis in the US. Evidence shows that patients are more likely to receive behavioral health diagnosis and treatment in primary care than in specialty mental health settings. COVID-19 disrupted primary care delivery, necessitating modifications to IBH. Social…
Behavioral health needs are on the rise in the United States, significantly influencing health care utilization, costs, and outcomes. Social workers offer diverse services across health, behavioral health, and community settings. Although this variety enhances care delivery, it also makes health workforce analyses more complex. This article describes the various estimates provided by 5 national…
The COVID-19 pandemic shifted the delivery of primary care, including a rapid transition to telehealth. While this shift provided critical access to services, not all patients have the capacity to optimally utilize telehealth, raising concerns for health equity during and after the pandemic. This article discusses the challenges of providing primary care services to vulnerable…
Total Medicaid funds invested in graduate medical education (GME) increased from $3.78 billion in 2009 to $7.39 billion in 2022. States have considerable flexibility in designing Medicaid GME payments to address population health needs. This article assesses statesā inclination for using Medicaid funds for GME, the structure of state Medicaid payments, the composition and charge…
Nurse workforce shortages are not new, yet concerns about a shortfall of nurses intensified across health care settings during the COVID-19 pandemic. To understand how a health care crisis such as COVID-19 can impact nurse turnover at national and regional levels, documentation of a baseline national turnover metric is needed for comparing future registered nurse…
Despite evidence supporting the integration of pharmacists in team-based primary care, little information exists on the co-location of pharmacists with primary care physicians in the United States, and even less information on the factors associated with these models in primary care. This article analyzes the degree to which pharmacists are co-located with primary care practices…
Onboarding new graduate physician assistants (PAs) and nurse practitioners (NPs) has become a popular topic due to current issues with provider shortages and financial deficiencies in our healthcare system. This JAAPA podcast discusses onboarding experiences of PAs and NPs in primary care.
The distribution of practicing physicians tends to be more concentrated in urban areas and less concentrated in rural areas. Understanding patterns of how physicians tend to migrate from place to place is important for determining local supply. This article compares physician data from the 2006 and 2011 American Medical Association Masterfile to help understand what…
Many major healthcare system innovations focus on changing the care delivery process, adopting technology, and adjusting workflows. However, most healthcare education and policy have not focused on training professionals to adapt to these increasingly integrated and coordinated systems. This article describes the ways in which healthcare training and education have not kept up with the…
Although physician workforce planning approaches the need for physicians of each specialty individually, in fact many services are provided by physicians of several specialties. Further, there is some evidence that physicians adjust the scope and balance of services they provide when there are too few physicians of other specialties in their communities, although when this…
