Turning Point Healthcare Advisors, Inc.

Our team provided the following to the medical center:

• Physician supply findings by specialty showing physician age (youngest, oldest, and weighted average) along with FTE supply projected for the next five years.
• A copy of the physician database Turning Point consultants developed to determine supply.
• Supply, demand, and variance by specialty projected for the next five years.
• Recommendation that the facility develop an aggressive recruitment plan to address the current shortage of nearly 29 primary care physicians, which was expected to grow to 42 in the next five years.
• Recommendations for the number of medical and surgical specialists, by specialty, necessary to meet community need over the next three years.
• Recommendations for solidifying physician relationships and improving physician retention.
  

The hospital used the information to set recruitment priorities and to craft its plan to strengthen its relationships with physicians currently on staff.

Medical Staff Engagement - Case #2

Issue

A coalition of rural hospitals in the west, formed to address mutual healthcare issues, wanted an objective study of physician supply and demand, by specialty, for eight of its members, seven of which were hospitals. 

Solutions

Turning Point consultants started by defining the service areas of each of the eight participating entities, taking into account Stark III regulations for defining a facility’s GASH (geographic area served by the hospital). Subsequent to establishing service areas, we obtained demographics specific to each.

Next, we determined physician supply by creating a database that contained demographic data about physicians in the entire geographic area served by the coalition. Included were physicians on the medical staffs of non-participating hospitals as well as the eight participants. This information was supplemented by accessing the state licensing board, National Practitioner Identifier Web site, and American Boards of Medical Specialties. Physician supply counts were documented from phone calls made to each physician office.

Once physician supply was known by specialty, our team applied physician-to-population ratios to calculate physician demand. For most specialties, the ratios for the 65+ population are higher than those for the <65 population to reflect the older group’s greater use of health care services.

The final step was to calculate the difference between supply and demand for each of the next five years, taking into account physicians expected to retire during the forecast period.

Results

Each of the eight participants received the following from Turning Point:

• Individual profiles of all physicians on each entity’s medical staff showing name, NPI number, date of birth, age, gender, specialty, FTE status, practice address(es), phone number(s), fax number(s), practice name, hospital affiliations, board certification(s), and state medical license number. (The sponsoring organization received the complete physician database.) 
• A supply and aging forecast, by specialty, showing the number of physicians in each specialty as well as the youngest, oldest, and average ages of those physicians.
• A forecast, by specialty, comparing the supply for each of the next five years to the projected demand.