U.S. Rep. Castor Continues to Address Looming Doctor Shortage

Today on Match Day, an annual rite of passage when medical school graduates across the country learn where they have been matched for their graduate medical education (GME), U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor announced new legislation that would provide federal support to help train an additional 15,000 resident physicians while introducing accountability and transparency initiatives for institutions receiving Medicare funding for physician training. Training Tomorrow's Doctors Today Act, which has broad-based support from numerous physician, hospital and other groups representing both primary and specialty care physicians, was introduced yesterday in the U.S. House of Representatives.

"Florida has about 20 medical residents per 100,000 residents, well below the national average of about 37 per 100,000 residents," U.S. Rep. Castor said, citing a 2015 Association of American Medical Colleges study. "This has aided in creating a looming doctor shortage and if we don't begin to tackle this, especially with our state's growing population, our neighbors will soon find it very challenging to access a doctor."

U.S. Rep. Castor unveiled Training Tomorrow's Doctors Today Act during the University of South Florida's Match Day, held at Ulele in Tampa.

"These bright USF students are graduating from one of the premiere health sciences institutions in the country," said U.S. Rep. Castor, who has heard from USF medical students who are concerned about the future of health care threatened by the expected doctor shortage. "I also took this opportunity to urge them to practice in Florida because this is the place to be -- part of our premiere institutions, like our hospitals, the James A. Haley VA Medical Center and Moffitt Cancer Center."

The number of residency positions for each state is arbitrarily capped based on a 20-year formula created by the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. States like Florida have seen a huge population boom since that time and are training doctors to meet their health care demands, but losing them to states with more residency slots and smaller populations.

U.S. Rep. Castor has been a long-time advocate of boosting GME positions for Florida, and last year introduced the bipartisan Creating Access to Residency Education (CARE) Act, which focused on awarding competitive grants to states with low GME slots to support increases in residencies.

The Training Tomorrow's Doctors Today Act would lift the 20-year freeze on Medicare support for a share of residency training costs. The proposal also would establish transparency and accountability measures, consistent with recommendations from the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission and other national advisory bodies, to demonstrate the extent that resident training programs are focusing on priorities that improve patient care and population health.

"Medical schools across the country have anticipated a doctor shortage and have worked to increase medical school enrollment. They have also used innovations in team-based care and the use of technology. However, we cannot effectively increase the supply of physicians to serve our neighbors across the country and Florida without increasing the number of GME positions," U.S. Rep. Castor added.

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