Graduate Medical Education and the AAMC

The following note from Eric Radin, MD:

I am a representative to the AAMC/CAS and am aware of what the AAMC is recommending on behalf of its constituency, a significant increase in medical school graduates and residency matriculates.

Health care access in the U.S. will be improved by more providers, but it is a costly mistake to have them mostly specialists, which is what the AAMC is promoting. They want medical schools to increase their enrollment by 15-30% and support a student's choice of specialty.

Our health care system is already overburdened by specialists --- 9:1 --- if you, as the rest of the world does, consider internists, pediatricians, and obstetricians as specialists.

Family Practice is fading, its numbers falling, more, and more of its residency positions going unfilled. Duke has recently closed its residency. Family practice, lacking high-ticket procedures, is not economically competitive for today's medical school graduates.

There appears to be a growing consensus that U.S. health care does not deliver value for its cost. The AAMC proposal, enlarging the specialist force , will only drive costs and service-driven care higher.