Primary Care Doctors Help Boost Life Spans, But More Are Needed
More primary care doctors mean longer life for patients, but a shortage of these physicians is looming, a new study finds.
Why? Fewer medical students are choosing primary care as a career, mostly because of money, the researchers noted.
However, every 10 additional primary care doctors per 100,000 Americans was associated with a nearly 52-day increase in life expectancy from 2005 to 2015. In contrast, 10 more specialists per 100,000 increased life expectancy by only 19 days, the researchers found.
"Primary care physicians serve as the primary point of contact for most of the population and often perform preventive care, cancer screening and early diagnosis," said study lead author Dr. Sanjay Basu. He's an assistant professor of medicine and health research and policy at Stanford University in California.
