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Published on: August 29, 2019
Will the Real Physician Retirees Please Stand Up?
Lindsay Hedden1, M Ruth Lavergne2, Kimberlyn M McGrail3
1Centre for Clinical Epidemiology and Evaluation, Research Pavilion, Vancouver General Hospital, Vancouver, BC.
Insights
Physician workforce estimates using practice licenses are unreliable for tracking retirement. Activity-based data provide more accurate measures of physician supply and retirement timing for health workforce planning.
Area of Science:
- Health Services Research
- Medical Workforce Analysis
- Public Health Policy
Background:
- Policy makers and health workforce planners utilize physician practice license counts to estimate the active physician workforce.
- Accurate data on physician supply and retirement are crucial for effective health system planning.
Purpose of the Study:
- To compare physician retirement estimates derived from licensure data versus physician payment data.
- To evaluate the reliability of practice licensure data for assessing physician workforce dynamics.
Main Methods:
- A population-based approach was employed to correlate retirement estimates from licensure data with those from physician payment data.
- Analysis focused on physician supply and retirement patterns in British Columbia.
Main Results:
- Licensure data produced substantially higher per-capita physician supply estimates compared to activity-based (payment) data.
- Discrepancies suggest licensure data do not accurately reflect active clinical practice or retirement timing.
Conclusions:
- Practice licensure data are unreliable for estimating the timing and extent of physician retirement.
- Health workforce planners should not rely solely on licensure data for current or future physician supply estimations.
- Activity-based data sources offer more dependable insights into physician workforce dynamics.
Abstract:
Policy makers and health workforce planners rely on counts of practice licences as a measure of the size of the active physician workforce. We use a population-based approach to correlate estimates of retirement from clinical care based on these data with those produced using physician payment data. We find that licensure data generates per-capita estimates of physician supply in British Columbia that are substantially higher than activity-based estimates. Licensure data are unlikely to produce reliable estimates of the timing and extent of physician retirement and therefore should not be used as the primary basis for estimating current or future physician supply.
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