Doctor Wait Times Average Almost Four Weeks In Big Cities

Healthcare Doctor Wait Times Average Almost Four Weeks In Big Cities Bruce Japsen Senior Contributor Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. I write about healthcare business and policy Following New! Follow this author to stay notified about their latest stories. Got it! Sep 12, 2022, 08:00am EDT | New! Click on the conversation bubble to join the conversation Got it! Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Patients are waiting an average of 26 days to schedule an appointment with a doctor, according to a .

. . [+] study of commonly used specialty physicians in 15 major U.

S. cities, according to physician staffing companies Merritt Hawkins and AMN Healthcare. getty Patients are waiting an average of 26 days to schedule an appointment with a doctor, according to a study of commonly used specialty physicians in 15 major U.

S. cities. The survey by Merritt Hawkins , a unit of healthcare staffing firm AMN Healthcare, polled more than 1,000 physician offices looking at average wait times among family medicine, dermatology, obstetrics/gynecology, orthopedic surgery and cardiology.

The average wait time is up 8% from 24. 1 days in 2017, “the last year the survey was conducted, and up from 21 days in 2004, when the survey first was conducted,” according to Merritt Hawkins and AMN Healthcare. “Physician appointment wait times are the longest they have been since we began conducting the survey,” Tom Florence, president of AMN Healthcare’s physician search division said in a statement accompanying the report.

“Longer physician appointment wait times are a significant indicator that the nation is experiencing a growing shortage of physicians. ” Though the analysis looked at major U. S.

cities, the wait times are likely worse elsewhere in the country given large markets tend to have more physicians because they are home to academic medical centers and high concentrations of healthcare facilities generally. “It’s a sobering sign for the rest of the country when even patients in large cities must wait weeks to see a physician,” Florence said. The Biden administration late last year moved to fund an additional 1,000 physician residency slots over the next five years to “address access to care, workforce shortages in high-need areas.

” It will take several years, however, for those residents to have an impact on appointment times in the U. S. , analysts say.

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Before the FDA Clinical or Safety Reviews Have Been Made Public Meanwhile, health insurers are pushing more of a team-based approach to healthcare to keep a lid on healthcare costs as the population ages, with the federal government shifting more commercial, Medicaid and Medicare dollars away from fee-for-service payment to value-based care models. But most of the new models use a physician as a quarterback even as doctors, retail clinics and other health systems are handing off more responsibilities to physician assistants and nurse practitioners. Here are some other highlights of the survey, which looked at wait times in Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, Minnesota, New York City, Philadelphia, Portland, San Diego, Seattle and Washington, D.

C. : · “The average wait time for an OB/GYN appointment in the 15 cities surveyed is 31. 4 days, up 19% from 26.

4 days in 2017. ” · “Average orthopedic surgery wait times are longest is San Diego at 55 days and shortest is Washington, D. C.

at five days. · “Average dermatology wait times are longest in Portland at 84 days and shortest in Philadelphia at nine days. ” · “Average cardiology appointment wait times are longest in Portland at 49 days and shortest in Dallas at 13 days.

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