Opinion: Lack of residencies leaves med school graduates without a career path

In 2007, I moved from New York to Michigan with the task of starting an anesthesiology residency program. Residency programs allow graduating medical students to learn skills and techniques that are specific to their practice under the supervision of experienced physicians. This new program in Michigan would be the inaugural anesthesiology resident class at Beaumont Hospital’s new medical school.

Arriving in 2010 and graduating in 2014, this class started off strong, having the highest first year board pass rate in the country. Our residency program, with classes of six versus the average 25, provides residents with personalized attention from practicing physicians and has the best opportunities for regional anesthesia and learning by offering a small program at a large hospital system.

As we celebrate the overwhelming success of our residency program at Beaumont, we must also advocate for more funding for other programs across the nation. The number of medical schools in our country is significantly increasing, and with it the number of medical school graduates. However, we have not seen the same increase in the number of available residency program spots. In 2021, anesthesiology programs, which only account for about 4% of all residency spots nationally, received 3,750 applications competing for 1,800 spots. This leaves almost 2,000 medical school graduates without a path to practice.

In addition to the lack of residency programs to train new medical school graduates, we are also experiencing significant physician shortages across the country, stemming from the retirement of older physicians along with the growth trajectory of the population. If we continue on this path, the Association of American Medical Colleges estimates shortages of between 37,800 and 124,000 physicians by 2034, including in both primary and specialty care.

Michigan is facing a significant decline in the number of primary care physicians, with more shortages expected by 2030. According to Kaiser Family Foundation data, the state currently has 269 health professional shortage areas with nearly 3 million people living in parts of the state with an inadequate population-to-provider ratio.

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The Michigan Academy of Family Physicians also reports that Michigan will be short 860 primary care physicians by 2030. These shortages pose a major risk to patients, especially in rural and underserved communities. It is critical that we invest in more residency programs to train new medical school graduates. This is one simple step we can take to help address the rampant physician shortages and increasing demands on the system to ensure all patients have access to quality care.

In December 2020, Congress added 1,000 new Medicare-supported GME positions and pledged to add another 200 per year over a five-year period in H.R. 133. This action ended a nearly 25-year freeze on federal support for graduate medical education positions. Also, the newly introduced Resident Physician Shortage Reduction Act of 2021 would address this issue, adding new 14,000 residency spots over seven years. This is a great first step, but we need more federal and local funding for residency programs. Michigan’s lawmakers must also allocate additional funding to bolster our local residency programs and address increasing physician shortages.

I was a resident at the UCLA Medical Center in 2000 and want to ensure that other graduating medical students also have access to those same opportunities. This is a public health crisis, as we need to address physician shortages nationally and in Michigan to ensure that all patients have access to quality care. It’s time to tell Congress and your local lawmakers to act and protect our communities by increasing funding for residency programs!

Dr. Roy Soto is the residency program director and a professor of anesthesiology at Beaumont Health System.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Opinion: Physician shortage underlines need for residency programs