The American College of Physicians recently warned that "primarycare, the backbone of the nation's health care system, is atgrave risk of collapse."1 And indeed, primary care is facinga confluence of factors that could spell disaster. Patientsare increasingly dissatisfied with their care and with the difficultyof gaining timely access to a primary care physician; many primarycare physicians, in turn, are unhappy with their jobs, as theyface a seemingly insurmountable task; the quality of care isuneven; reimbursement is inadequate; and fewer and fewer U.S.medical students are choosing to enter the field.
Dr. Bodenheimer is a professor at the Center for Excellence in Primary Care in the Department of Family and Community Medicine, University of California, San Francisco.
Related Letters:
The State of Primary Care
Chretien J. H., Das R. R., Moorthi R. N., Becker K. L., Carleton S., Lin G. I., Poplin C., Oserman S., Fields L. S., Kirk L. M., Bodenheimer T.
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N Engl J Med 2006;
355:2595-2598, Dec 14, 2006.
Correspondence
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