Medical groups' median clinical staffing per provider has returned to pre-COVID levels. However, rising production demands have outpaced the growth in support staffing, leading to a greater reliance on advanced practice clinicians.
That's according to the American Medical Group Association's new "2024 Medical Clinic Staffing Survey." The survey is based on responses from 38 medical groups reporting staffing for 7,697 clinics and representing 31,415 providers. Eighty-three percent of the total clinics, representing 88% of the total providers participating, come from health system-affiliated organizations.
Here are seven findings from the survey:
1. Considering total clinic staff per provider (including both physicians and advanced practice clinicians), the median for all groups for 2024 is 2.15 total clinic staff full-time equivalents per provider FTE. This compares to 2.13 in 2020 and 2.03 in 2022.
2. At the same time, medical groups reported an overall 5.2% increase in median productivity (e.g., work relative value units or wRVUs) in AMGA's "2024 Medical Group Compensation and Productivity Survey." They also reported a 3% increase in median visits compared to the prior years' survey data. During the same period, staffing levels only increased 1.3% per provider.
3. In 2020, there were 4.35 FTE clinic staff per 10,000 wRVUs at the median, compared to 3.71 FTEs per 10,000 wRVUs in 2024, representing a 14.7% reduction in staffing when adjusted for volume.
4. "It is important to note that productivity-adjusted staffing is artificially deflated due to the CMS changes in wRVU values over the last couple of years," AMGA Consulting Vice President and COO Mike Coppola said in a news release. "Medical groups continue to face staffing challenges in the overall economic environment."
5. Regarding access, medical groups affiliated with health systems reported an increase in wait times for established patients (third next available appointment slot for a patient), from 1.1 days in 2022 to 4.4 days in 2024.
6. Within medical groups affiliated with health systems, schedule fill rates increased nearly 5% from 2022 to 2024.
7. The median share of advanced practice clinicians in health system-affiliated organizations accounts for 48.1% of the provider workforce in primary care, compared with 39.6% in 2020.
Read more about the survey here.