Primary Care Workforce Facts and Stats

AHRQ Releases First in a New Facts and Stats Series Analyzing the Size and Capacity of the U.S. Primary Care Workforce 
To further inform policy discussions around the U.S. primary care workforce, the Agency for Healthcare
Research and Quality’s (AHRQ) Center for Primary Care, Prevention, and Clinical Partnerships has released the first two in a series of fact sheets to provide health care policy and decisionmakers with information on:
.The primary care workforce in place currently in the U.S.
.Its capacity to care for the current U.S. population.
.Needed growth in this workforce to accommodate population changes and expanded health insurance coverage.
The two fact sheets available now are:
..The Number of Practicing Primary Care Physicians in the U.S., which reports that, of the 624,434 physicians in the United States who spend the majority of their time in direct patient care, slightly less than one-third are specialists in primary care.
..The Number of Nurse Practitioners and Physician Assistants Practicing Primary Care in the U.S., which estimates that, in 2010, approximately 56,000 nurse practitioners and 30,000 physician assistants were practicing primary care in the United States.
AHRQ commissioned the Robert Graham Center – a non-partisan primary care policy and analysis organization -- to conduct a comprehensive primary care workforce analysis that includes secondary analyses of several workforce, population, and health outcome data sources.

During the coming months, AHRQ will release additional Primary Care Workforce Fact Sheets examining topics such as:
-The distribution of the U.S. primary care workforce.

- Patient panel sizes in primary care.
Primary care workforce needs due to changes in population growth, demographic and other factors.
To view and bookmark the U.S. Primary Care Workforce Facts and Stats Series go to: http://www.ahrq.gov/research/pcworkforce.htm .
Primary Care Workforce Facts and Stats