Improving Rural Access to Emergency Physicians

The recent Institute of Medicine report entitled The Future of Emergency Care in the United States Health System acknowledges workforce issues in rural America but does not adequately address the current shortage of emergency medicine residency-trained and board-certified emergency physicians in rural America. Areas worthy of further attention to ameliorate this threat include 1) government and hospital support of emergency medicine resident educational debt load, 2) modification of residency review committee for emergency medicine guidelines to permit modified training programs that are rural focused, and 3) support of pilot projects designed to modify the delivery of rural emergency care under remote supervision by academic medical center-based practitioners. The authors discuss these potential solutions to help guide policy makers seeking to enhance rural emergency care delivery through a stronger emergency medicine workforce.