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California congressmen introduce bills to address physician shortage

Two important bills have been introduced in Congress to address our state’s serious physician shortage and improve access to care in California. The first bill, the Training the Next Generation of Primary Care Doctors Act of 2017 (HR 3394), would reauthorize for an additional three years the Teaching Health Center Graduate Medical Education (GME) program that was established by the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The Teaching Health Center program is a community-based primary care physician training program that has been extremely successful in expanding the physician workforce in underserved areas. ...

Guillermo J. Valenzuela Foundation Awards $180,00 in Grants to Inland Groups Serving Families, Women in Need

Guillermo J. Valenzuela Foundation Awards $180,000 in Grants to Inland Groups Serving Families, Women in Need Grants by Inland-based foundation support its mission to improve the health of underserved communities in San Bernardino and Riverside Counties. (San Bernardino, CA) -- The Guillermo J. Valenzuela Foundation announced today that it has awarded $180,000 in grants to several local organizations that work to improve the health and well-being of underserved families and women in the Inland Empire. Founded and funded by longtime Inland physician Dr. Guillermo Valenzuela, the 2017 grant awards were provided to ...

California grapples with 'severe' doctor shortage, study shows

California doesn't have enough doctors to handle its primary health care demands and the problem is getting worse. A new study by UCSF Healthforce Center finds that California doesn’t have enough primary care physicians in most regions of the state. According to the study, the shortage is becoming more acute because of an aging physician workforce, a growing patient population and expanded coverage through the Affordable Care Act. According to the study, only two regions of California (the Greater Bay Area and Sacramento) have ratios of primary care physicians per ...

California State Loan Repayment Program now acccepting applications

The California State Loan Repayment Program (SLRP) application cycle for 2016 is now open. The program assists with the repayment of educational loans for health care professionals who work in underserved areas of California. The program was congressionally authorized in 1987 to increase the number of primary care physicians and other health care professionals practicing in federally designated Health Professional Shortage Areas (HPSA) in California. Grant recipients must commit to two-year, full-time or four-year, half-time service agreement to provide direct patient care in a primary, dental or mental health HPSA. Awardees ...

UC Riverside School of Medicine receives $2.3 million grant to address region's poor chronic disease metrics

The School of Medicine at the University of California, Riverside, has received a five-year, $2.3 million grant from the Health Resources and Services Administration Primary Care Training and Enhancement Program. The grant will allow the medical school to help transform the local health care system by embedding continuous quality improvement in inland Southern California primary care practices. “We will deploy a research curriculum to equip medical students, residents, practicing physicians and pharmacists with the population health skills needed to address inland Southern California’s poor chronic disease metrics and health care ...

AMA introduces tool that allows physicians to pinpoint underserved patient care areas

The American Medical Association (AMA) announced today that it was introducing a mapping tool that lets physicians see the distribution of physicians and nonphysician clinicians by specialty, state, county or metropolitan area. Called the Health Workforce Mapper, AMA believes the tool will be useful to physicians so they can identify the best locations to establish or expand a medical practice based on regional needs for access to care and the existing health care workforce. The tool can identify and prioritize underserved areas; create and display ratios of physicians and nonphysician clinicians to ...

Governor signs bill for Steve M. Thompson loan repayment program

Governor Jerry Brown has signed a California Medical Association (CMA)-sponsored bill that will refine the eligibility criteria for a successful physician retention program, the Steven M. Thompson Physician Corps Loan Repayment Program. The program provides grants of up to $105,000 to physicians who agree to practice in medically-underserved areas of the state for at least three years.   The program was created in 2002 under a bill sponsored by CMA. Since its inception, the program has awarded more than $17 million to over 220 individuals. Unfortunately, high demand for this program ...

Governor signs CMA-sponsored bill to expedite physician licensure for practice in underserved areas

Governor Jerry Brown has signed a bill (AB 1288) sponsored by the California Medical Association (CMA) that requires priority review status be given to the license applications of physicians who can demonstrate that they intend to practice in a medically-underserved area or serve a medically-underserved population.   With California facing an uneven disbursement of physicians, increasing the physician pipeline to those areas to ensure delivery of safe, quality medical care will be crucial to the health of those communities.   “We need more physicians in rural and underserved areas of California,” said Paul ...