Healthcare News and Trends
A Growing Number of Physicians are Employed
May 06, 2022
By Phillip Miller
Marcus Welby – the classic, independent family physician who
followed his patients from the cradle to old age – is an icon from the past.
For years, a growing number of physicians have become
employees while a dwindling number have remained independent practice owners or
partners. A new study
commissioned by the Physicians Advocacy Institute
and conducted by Avalere Health puts some startling numbers
to this trend.
According to the study, three quarters of all physicians
(74%) now are employed by a hospital, health system or a corporate entity. The
study notes that 52.1% of physicians now are employed by a hospital or health
system, with the number of hospital/health system employed physicians growing
by 11% from July 2020 to January 2022. This
presumably includes physicians employed directly by hospitals and health
systems and those employed by hospital and health system-owned medical groups,
the number of which is increasing. According to the study, the number of
hospital-owned physician practices grew by 8% during the study period.
The study indicates there also was a significant increase in
the number of physicians employed by corporate entities such as insurance
companies and investor groups. During the same period from July 2020 to January
2022, the percentage of physicians employed by corporate entities grew from
15.3% to 21.8%. Optum, owned by insurance giant UnitedHealth Group, alone employs
approximately 55,000 physicians, or about 6.5% of the roughly 850,000 physicians
actively providing patient care.
In its annual Review of Physician and Advanced
Practitioner Recruiting Incentives, Merritt Hawkins tracks the number of
physician search engagements it conducts featuring employed settings versus independent
practice settings. The Review indicates that the great majority of
physicians accepting new positions today – more than 90% -- will practice as
employees and not as independent practice owners/partners. By contrast, in
2001, the number was approximately 60%.
The increasing corporatization of medicine is being driven
by a number of factors, including the rising complexity and financial
uncertainty of running a medical practice, both of which have been exacerbated
by COVID-19. The result is that most physicians today are a part of large and
consolidating organizations rather than small, independently owned businesses.
Phillip Miller is Senior Principal of Thought Leadership for
AMN Healthcare, the nation’s leader and innovator of healthcare workforce
solutions. Merritt Hawkins is a division of AMN Healthcare. He can be reached at phil.miller@amnhealthcare.com.
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