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WASHINGTON, D.C.—In the next 15 years, it will be increasingly difficult to provide adequate care for rising numbers of patients with rheumatic diseases due to a severe shortage of trained rheumatology healthcare providers, according to the ACR’s 2015 Workforce Study of Rheumatology Specialists in the United States.
The full study is available online, and panelists from private practice and academic centers led a discussion on the study’s findings and ideas to address workforce shortages at a Nov. 14, 2016, session, The Rheumatology Workforce: Present and Future, at the 2016 ACR/ARHP Annual Meeting.
“By 2025, the U.S. will face a shortage of physicians. Of course, this will impact primary care a lot, but in some cases, the rheumatologist is the primary care provider for our patients,” said Daniel F. Battafarano, DO, MACP, FACR, a rheumatologist at San Antonio Military Medical Center in Texas, and co-chair of the Workforce Study Group with Seetha U. Monrad, MD, at the University of Michigan. The new ACR workforce data mirror what other subspecialties of medicine face today, he said.