Geriatricians provide a critical service in the increasingly silver-haired United States, but the medical specialty continues to stagnate.
Medicine is not attracting enough candidates to satisfy the growing need in the country, according to a January analysis by The New York Times. A 2018 analysis found that from 1998, when the specialty began through the academic year 2017–2018, the number of graduate fellowship programs that train geriatricians, grew to just 210 from 182. And among graduate fellowships (aside from geriatric psychiatry), more than a third of 384 slots went unfilled in 2019, the American Geriatrics Society found.
It is projected that the U.S. will need 33,200 geriatricians in 2025, the analysis said. It currently has about 7,000, with only half practicing full time.
Why the slow growth? Money is one reason. The specialty does not command the attractive salary of other medical specialties.
But lawmakers and others agree the need is real. In December, a Senate committee voted to reauthorize a $41 million program that educates health professionals in geriatrics. The House passed a companion bill.
From the February 2020 Issue of McKnight's Long-Term Care News
