Medical Economics June 30, 2021
Only 30 percent of U.S. physicians were practicing independently at the start of this year.
The COVID-19 pandemic may have put another nail in the coffin of independent physician practices in the U.S., as physician employment rose while the disease ran roughshod over the country.
According to a study from the Physician Advocacy Institute (PAI), only 30 percent of physicians were independently practicing medicine at the beginning of 2021, while 70 percent reported being employed by hospital systems or corporate entities. Specifically, 48,400 physicians left independent practice to become employees of a hospital or corporate entity between Jan. 1, 2019, and Jan. 1, 2021; about 22,700 of those physicians made the switch after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Meanwhile,...