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WOEMA Position Paper and Call-to-Action: California Needs More Physicians Specializing in Occupational and
Akbar Sharip1, Paul Papanek, Craig Conlon
1From the Loma Linda University School of Medicine, Department of Preventive Medicine, Loma Linda, California (A.S.); California Division of Occupational Safety and Health, Long Beach, California (P.J.P.); Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, University of California Irvine, Irvine, California (P.J.P., A.K., M.B.); Alameda County Public Health Department, San Leandro, California (C.C.); Liberty Mutual, Inc., Anaheim, California (C.J.G.); and University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, California (R.H.).Online Letters to the Editor in this issue have offered commentary on this publication.
Objective:
This paper describes the critical shortage of physicians trained in occupational and environmental medicine (OEM) in California, analyzes the adverse impacts of that shortage, and proposes a specific target for increasing OEM residency slots.
Methods:
Literature review.
Results:
The US ratio of OEM physicians to workers is 2 per 100,000 workers, compared with a ratio of 4 to 40 per 100,000 workers in most industrialized nations. California's shortage OEM physicians costs the state's employers over $1 billion annually in needless workers' compensation losses and other health impacts. Graduating 40 additional OEM residents in the state annually would cost an extra $27 to 32 million per year.
Conclusions:
The return-on-investment from increasing the number of OEM residencies and residency slots in California would be substantial, approaching at least 10-to-1, benefitting the state's workers and employers, and its environmental quality.
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