Assessment of Physician Growth in Counties Targeted in the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Southern Rural Access Program

Publication Date: August 2006

Publisher: Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research, University of Carolina at Chapel Hill

Author(s): T.C. Ricketts; J.S. Groves; D.E. Pathman

Research Area: Health

Type: Report

Abstract:

In 1997, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation initiated the Southern Rural Access Program (SRAP) to increase the number of primary care providers in underserved areas and to strengthen the capacity of rural communities to address their health care needs. The program awarded over $30 million in grants and ended in 2006. Two evaluations of the program took place in 1999 and 2004. This report presents the findings of a third follow-up to assess the program's achievements.

The researchers used data from the American Medical Association's (AMA) Physician Masterfile to measure the increase in the number of primary care physicians and specialist physicians in areas targeted by the program from 2001 to 2005. The analyses revealed a greater growth of primary care physicians to population ratios in SRAP-targeted counties than in non-SRAP counties. In high poverty SRAP-targeted counties the physician numbers grew faster than in non-SRAP high poverty areas (4.4% compared to 1.7%). In addition, growth of specialist physicians was slower in SRAP-targeted counties than in non-SRAP counties. The researchers estimated that as of October 2005, SRAP was responsible for recruiting and retaining 73 of the primary care physicians practicing in 124 of the programs' rural counties. Although these results provide some indication of the effects of SRAP, the long-term significance of some of the program's initiatives, such as encouraging youth to pursue careers in medicine, will not become evident for a number of years.