A recent research study in the news highlighted a concern that there are not enough physicians to serve the Florida population; a unfortunate combination of the fact that the population is going up and the number of doctors is going down. There doesn’t seem to be any doubt that there aren’t enough doctors to go around, but I did not see any convincing reasons in the news reports regarding why doctors are leaving. (In Idaho, for example, OB/GYNs are leaving the state because they fear being arrested for doing their jobs and accidently violating the new abortion laws.) It shouldn’t be that hard to ask a few Florida doctors why they are moving, quitting, or retiring.

I was able to dig up a few items for reference with data from the US Census Bureau. In Massachusetts, there are 460 doctors for every 100,000 people. By contrast, Florida has only 270. Maybe they are quitting because they are overworked; this would be a doom spiral. Also, in Florida, 12% of the population is uninsured while in MA it’s 2%. So maybe doctors move out of Florida because they can’t get paid by uninsured patients. And by the way, Idaho has the fewest doctors per resident (see my last paragraph). OK, here’s another one: Florida has about 19 physicians in training (i.e., in a state residency program) for every 100,000 people while Massachusetts has 84. Studies show that doctors who complete residencies are likely to stay in the state where they were trained. So, maybe there aren’t enough young doctors joining the workforce. One more factor is that doctors in Florida, like everyone else who lives there, are older than those in other states. This means that they are retiring at a higher rate. There was some anecdotal evidence that the older doctors are fed up with restrictive policies of the large corporations that now employ them, which was not the case when they were younger and practicing independently, incenting them to retire

In searching for more information, I found an opinion piece on LinkedIn about the doctor shortage in panhandle Bay County, FL, under the byline “Michelle Hertog,” who appears to be an associate realtor with the advertising slogan “Your Friend in Real Estate.” After Ms. Hartog concisely and accurately summarized the recent research report on the shortage of physicians, she provided this conclusion, which I quote verbatim, including the word ‘conclusion’:

“Conclusion: Summarize the main points and arguments of the essay. Restate the thesis and emphasize the urgency and importance of addressing the doctor shortage in Bay County, Florida. Provide some recommendations or call to action for the stakeholders involved, such as the local government, health care providers, educational institutions, and community organizations.”

You can’t make this stuff up.

This of course inspired me to go to the universal source of truth, ChatGPT. It actually suggested some things that I had not considered, including:

• Malpractice insurance rates are very high in Florida, due to restrictive laws about liability, particularly in high risk practice areas;
• There are telemedicine restrictions in Florida that do not occur in other states;
• Insurance regulations lead to more paperwork and wasted time completing insurance requirements for patients than exist in many other states; and finally
• There are apparently licensing transfer restrictions in Florida that make it more difficult to move there for a practice than exist in other states.

In all fairness, my Mom lived for 20 years in Ft Myers, Florida at a Continuing Care Retirement Community and received excellent health care. The nearby hospital took good care of her, and the medical staff at her assisted living facility was top notch. So don’t go thinking from all this that you can’t get health care in Florida. On the other hand, her situation might not have been the norm for the average Florida resident. And, as far as I know, she never had her blood pressure checked by Doctor Pelican.