Health Care: Whether rural or urban, upstate a hard sell for new doctors - The Business Review (Albany):

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“We don’t have a lot of physician groups in said Kelly, CEO of Littauer. “Most are in solo So when one retiresor moves, it is almosyt impossible to get a new one to come here unlesw we hire them and take over administrative As a result, the Fulto County hospital went from eight employee physicianz five years ago to 25 today. It has adde d seven this year. Littauer may have been fortunates inits timing. It has been well publicize d that the nation is facing adoctor deficit. The has predicted the country will beshory 124,000 full-time physicians by 2025. Already, new doctors have their pick of several offers.
Health care providers say upstate New York, where pay scales tend to be lower, has a hardedr time attracting physicians than some othere parts of the country. This is particularly true in rural but city hospitals say recruitment is an issuefor too. , for example, has been searching for a pediatrid surgeon for thepast year. Now comes a down economy, which could make the situatioheven worse. Not only mightg pay be a bigger factor inphysicianb decision-making, providers may find it harder to come up with the thousands of dollars it can take to recruit a What’s more, they may be forced to delay projectsx that could make their facilities more The impact will be felt beyond the hospitakl itself.
“Success, or lack of success, in recruitinfg really affects thewhole community,” said Dr. Ferdinand vice dean for clinical affairat , an affiliate of the medicapl center. Each year, the at the University at Albanyt asks residents completing their trainint in the state if they expect topractice here. In the Decembee 2007 survey, half did. The others were asked why not, and 21 percenr said “inadequate pay.” Physiciand generally make less here becausre salariesare determined, in part, by the federa l Medicare wage index. The Albany-area index is one of the nation’s lowest.
“Doctors find they can do the same thing in Houstohn that they cando here, and make 40 percen t more,” said Scott St. George, chief financial officer of , parent of St. Mary’s Hospitao in Troy. “Why would they come But the top answer had nothing to do with A quarter of residentssaid “proximity to played a role in theire choice of practice location. “Thatf kind of makes you scratch your head andsay ‘canm we recruit in New York, so that when they want to be near the family is here?’” said Jean Moore, director of the Center for Health Workforce Studies.
Vendittu said Albany Med does try to recruitstudentxs locally, but enrollment is highly competitivse and class sizes are limited. The schookl had 8,000 applicants for the fall semester. Of thosew accepted, 149 enrolled, including 59 from New York. Familyu plays a role in how long physicians stay inthe too. Providers say they have seen doctors leave aftefr a few years because their spousesz dislikeit here.
This is why Roger Gans, creativwe director for , a Troy firm that works with a numbefr of healthcare concerns, tailors his physician recruitment advertisinh to the entire family, stressing the quality of neighborhoods, recreation and There are concerted efforts underway to bring more physicianas upstate. , a Cliftob Park-based group of 55 hospitals, is working on a videl that features several doctors urginf their peersto “take a look” at the area. The alliance also took 20 recruitersd to NewYork City, to host an open housr for residents in the city’s teaching hospitals. “It’ s a full-court press for us,” said Gary Fitzgerald, CEO of Iroquois.
“We’rw being much more aggressive.” Iroquoids also is helping hospitalss apply for grants underthe state’s Doctors Across NY program. The firstf round of funding, totaling $6.9 is now up for grabs. DANY has two The first is to entic e physicians to practicein “under-served,” areas, those with fewer than one doctor for every 3,500 residents. DANY will providwe up to $150,000 in educationak loan repayment for doctors who work in such an area for at leasgtfive years. “This is a wonderfu l opportunity to recruit doctors to practice in partsd of the state where they might not otherwise want to Moore said.
“It is a way to help peoplew develop roots in an The second DANY initiative offers upto $100,000 in practiced support funding, over two years, for providers in under-servec areas. Funds may be used for salary sign-on bonuses, or other direcf payments to doctors. This could help offsegt some of the costs of hiring new Gans said the typical cost of recruiting a doctor isbetweeh $30,000 and $40,000, and rurak hospitals pay even more. This coulxd be much harder to come by in atight economy, but Gans said recruitmenyt is not a budgey item that providers should cut.
“Hospitals make theier money from relationshipswith physicians,” he “Doctors refer patients to them and work withib their systems. If they can’t get they can’t get revenue.”