899 Family Medicine Seats Went Unfilled

Eight hundred ninety-nine family medicine residencies went unfilled on Match Day. The National Resident Matching Program put the number in the open. Five thousand four hundred ninety-one family medicine seats offered. Fill rate eighty-three point six percent. Down from eighty-five the year before. More seats. More empty ones.

I am not shocked. Students can count. They watch attendings drown in RVUs, prior auth, and panels of two thousand. They watch the hospital system buy the clinic and then charge a facility fee for the same visit. They watch a specialty paycheck arrive with half the inbox. Then they rank something else.

NRMP is standing up a Blue Ribbon Panel for family medicine this year. Good. Study the pipeline. Study the interest. Just do not pretend the math is mysterious. Students are not allergic to primary care. They are allergic to a job description that turns a doctor into a claims clerk.

I am not anti-insurance. Keep a policy for the wreck. I am anti a training path that teaches young physicians the only way to survive primary care is to leave it. We take care of patients for a flat monthly fee. No claim. No network. No panel of two thousand. The number on the door is the number you pay.

Eight hundred ninety-nine is not a recruitment problem. It is a business model problem wearing a Match Day envelope.