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2% Of New Doctors Pick Primary Care

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The Associated Press

Published: September 10, 2008

CHICAGO - Only 2 percent of graduating medical students say they plan to work in primary care internal medicine, raising worries about a looming shortage of the first-stop doctors who have been the backbone of the American medical system.

The results of a new survey being published today suggest that more medical students, many of them saddled with debt, are opting for more lucrative specialties.

The survey of nearly 1,200 fourth-year students found that just 2 percent planned to work in primary care internal medicine, compared with a similar survey in 1990, when the figure was 9 percent.

Paperwork, the demands of the chronically sick and the need to bring work home are among the factors pushing young doctors away from careers in primary care, the survey found.

Karen Hauer of the University of California, San Francisco, the study's lead author, said it's hard work taking care of the chronically ill, the elderly and people with complex diseases - "especially when you're doing it with time pressures and inadequate resources."

The salary gap may be another reason. More pay in a particular specialty tends to mean more U.S. medical school graduates fill residencies in those fields at teaching hospitals, Mark Ebell of the University of Georgia found in a separate study.
Family medicine had the lowest average salary last year, $186,000, and the lowest share of residency slots filled by U.S. students, 42 percent. Orthopedic surgery paid $436,000, and 94 percent of residency slots were filled by U.S students.

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