Primary care physician shortage challenges health system

REGION

As the need for primary care physicians increases in the midstate, their numbers decrease statewide, according to the Hospital & Healthsystem Association in Pennsylvania.

As the population ages, more care management of chronic conditions is needed. But medical students are selecting specialties instead of primary care, local physicians said. The shortage has been continuing for more than a decade, said Dr. James Herman, department chairman for family and community medicine at Penn State College of Medicine in Derry Township.

In 1960, half of all physicians in the country were in primary care, he said. By 1978, the percentage had fallen to 36 percent, and …