WASHINGTON: A high powered Institute of medicine advisory panel “IOM” recommended cuts in federal funding for graduates of medical education to curb oversupply of physicians, Federal Medicare program spends more than Six Billion Dollars every year to train medical graduates, 25% of which are foreign medical.
The panel reported that three quarters of foreign graduates who seek training in USA end up staying and practicing in this country, thus causing overabundance of physicians that could soon become a true surplus.
The panel recommended: Reduce the total number of Medicare funded first year residency slots to only train U.S, educated medical graduates; Reduce the number of class size of the nation’s 125 medical schools; Provide extra funding for the 77 US hospitals that rely heavily on FMGs.
A similar report by San Francisco. Based Pew Health Professions Committee last year caused a stir among medical professionals, when it recommended closure of 25% of US medical schools by 2005.
However, IOM recommendations are not intended to shut out FMGs completely. The hospitals that sponsor FMGs to their programs will have 10 find alternate means of funding for training expenses in future. Provided by: Satnam Singh Atwal, Fresno, CA.
Article extracted from this publication >> March 13, 1996
