Government policies have increased the paperwork that physicians must process and the time they must spend arguing with insurance companies on behalf of their patients. The policies have increased the need for back-office staff to handle the regulations, and so increased the overhead of private practice. So more and more physicians have given up private practice and become employees. They find their work less fulfilling and face burnout. Patients suffer when more of their physicians are bitter and burned-out.
(p. A1) There’s a question dividing the medical practice right now: Is being a doctor a job, or a calling?
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(p. A2) Physicians work an average of 59 hours a week, according to the American Medical Association, and while the profession is well-compensated—the average physician makes $350,000, a recent National Bureau of Economic Research analysis found—it comes with high pressure and emotional strain.
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Among physicians under age 45, only 32% own practices, down from 44% in 2012. By comparison, 51% of those ages 45 to 55 are owners.
Owners have more autonomy, but also increasing overhead costs. Vaughan, who sold his private practice in 2011, saw his malpractice insurance premiums increase to $65,000 a year.
Dr. Joseph Comfort, 80, sold his anesthesiology practice in 2003, frustrated by rising billing tussles with insurance companies. He now works part time as an internal medicine doctor at a small concierge clinic in Sanford, Fla.
“We’ve been ripped down off our pedestals,” he says.
For generations, Comfort says, doctors accepted being at the mercy of their pager and working long hours as the cost of doing business. “We took it because we considered ourselves to be masters of our own fate,” he says. “Now, everything’s changed. Doctors are like any other employee, and that’s how the new generation is behaving.”
They also spend far more time doing administrative tasks. One 2022 study found residents spent just 13% of their time in patient rooms, a factor many correlate with burnout.
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In San Francisco, Dr. Christopher Domanski—a first-year resident who had his first child earlier this year—says he’s interested in pursuing a four-day workweek once he’s completed his training.
“I’m very happy to provide exceptional care for my patients and be there for them, but medicine has become more corporatized,” says Domanski, 29. Though he’s early in his medical career, he’s heard plenty of physicians complain about needing to argue with insurance companies to get their patients the treatments they need.
“It’s disheartening,” he says.
For the full story see:
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date November 3, 2024 [sic], and has the title “Young Doctors Want Work-Life Balance. Older Doctors Say That’s Not the Job.”)