Despite nearing the end of residencies in primary care, Richard Joseph, MD, and Sohan Japa, MD, wrote in an op-ed for STAT that they, along with roughly 80 percent of internal medicine residents, will not be pursuing traditional careers in the field.
Dr. Joseph and Dr. Japa say the time required for documentation has usurped time once dedicated to developing meaningful patient relationships. PCPs' comparatively low salaries are insufficient for paying off years of medical school debt, and PCP training often overburdens residents with Medicare patients and offers them little exposure to outpatient care.
Dr. Joseph and Dr. Japa attribute these problems to "a deeper existential crisis in primary care," in which PCPs are required to be "all things to all patients." Meanwhile, Americans are increasingly eschewing PCP visits in favor of more specialized care.
To remedy the issue, the physicians argue PCPs must further specialize their practice by working in areas such as opioid treatment, high-risk patient hospitalization or elderly training programs. PCPs can thereby retain the profession's core value of deep provider-patient relationships while adapting to a world in which they are no longer the sole provider on a patient's healthcare team.
Click here for a more in-depth look at Dr. Joseph's and Dr. Japa's arguments.