Money of course drives everything in healthcare. The federal government has led the movement to systematically devalue primary care over the past two decades mostly by specialists influencing Medicare reimbursement rates.

As a response, for the past decade, only about 5% of graduating medical residents pursued primary care– mostly because they feel like they should earn more than nurses considering their investment in medical school and residency training.

When boomers die or retire, primary care, the backbone of a highly functioning healthcare system, is dead. And no amount of health insurance reform can fix this problem, especially when the most affordable insurance plans depend on primary care doctors as the gatekeepers. We’re 20 years behind the game. We’ve let the “System” stop functioning like a System and become an industry. And now DC is thinking that we can create a “System” out of an industry that has formed based on profits, not need. 

Nurse Anesthetists salaries now surpass those of primary care doctors