Trends of Medical Education in North Carolina Colleges

North Carolina possesses one of the best education systems and it has pride on it, especially for the higher education it provides in the country.The North Carolina Institute of Medicine estimates that by 2014 about 1.1 million people of the state will possess the health insurance which is provisioned under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Public Law 111-148, 2010). This wave would bless the citizens with the best medical system.

North Carolina is consistent in its ranks in the bottom third of states regarding several health issues. The top four causes of death here were heart disease, stroke and this has led to the thought to implement and come up with new models of care. Skilled physicians are needed to serve the people well and the colleges here shall create these talented medical professionals.

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-CH) has recently expanded medical school class sizes and itwouldexpand further if additional resources were available. As the budget is limited and competing funding priorities arise, it has become increasingly important to evaluate the state’s return on investment in medical education.

North Carolina is consistently lagging behind the national average of medical students per capita. In 2010, NC had 19.8 students per 100,000 population compared to 23.5 students nationally. North Carolina also had fewer medical students per 100,000 population compared to the neighboring states of South Carolina (21.2), Virginia (22.6), and Tennessee (27.8) but had more students than Georgia (18.3) in 2010. In order to increase the number of doctors, the colleges have increased the number seats. These expansions will increase North Carolina’s ratio of medical students to population, but only about 40% of NC graduates practice in the state. Due to this reason students from the other states are attracted to these institutes.

A declining number of North Carolina-trained are physicians retained in state. This gap is filled in by medical graduate (IMGs) who has increased from 7.9% in 1990 to 13.2% of the workforce in 2010. Although there are (IMGs) but North Carolina still has lower percentage of doctors. Despite these increases, North Carolina still has a lower percentage of IMGs than the US median of 17.8%. Along with this there are a very low percentage of people who practice in the rural areas. As the people who graduated from NC do not practice here, doctors have to be imported from other states.

North Carolina has been successful in increasing physician workforce diversity in part by increasing the diversity of the medical school classes and also by importing graduates from other states and countries.North Carolina is experiencing an exceptional transformation in the organization and consolidation of health care services. The demand for physicians will increase as the population expands andas the risk of diseases increases.

The access of health insurance is another factor that would need more number of physicians. The constant effort to track the trends shall help to plan the work force needed in North Carolina in the future.


---

Keywords: College North Carolina, NC Community College, RCC

By: robesoncollege

Free Article Directory: http://www.jumparticles.com

Copy and Paste Link Code:
<a href="http://www.jumparticles.com/1008361">Trends of Medical Education in North Carolina Colleges</a>

Article ID 1008361
This article has been viewed 1409 times