Why America's Doctor Shortage Might Mean Trouble for Obamacare

[ProSense]

22. From the OP article:

"We need things like high-skill immigration for MDs, more urgent care clinics, and relaxed nurse practitioner licensing so they can take the lead on more cases."

"Immigration as a solution"? Here are some ways in which this is being addressed.

Affordable Care Act Section 5508
http://bhpr.hrsa.gov/grants/teachinghealthcenters/section5508.html

HHS awards $320 million to expand primary care workforce
http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2010pres/09/20100927e.html

Creating Jobs by Addressing Primary Care Workforce Needs

<...>

Supporting Community Health Centers: The Affordable Care Act created the Community Health Center Fund, which provides $11 billion over five years for the operation, expansion and construction of health centers nationwide. Today, more than 1,200 health centers operate nearly 9,000 service delivery sites that provide primary care to more than 20 million patients nationwide, a third of whom are children. Since the beginning of 2009, health centers have added an additional 2,200 full-time physicians and 2,400 full-time nurse practitioners, physician assistants, and certified nurse midwives.

<...>

http://www.hhs.gov/healthcare/facts/factsheets/2013/06/jobs06212012.html

Community health centers, which also provide dental care, are going to be a big factor going forward.

A Health Care Success Story

Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday brought together leaders of community health centers from across Vermont where three new centers opening in January are part of a dramatic expansion of affordable primary care. A Sanders provision in the Affordable Care Act authorized $11 billion to build, expand, and operate community health centers throughout the United States. “This is a huge step forward,” said Sanders, chairman of a Senate subcommittee that oversees primary health care.

Sanders was joined at the news conference by representatives of the Battenkill Valley Health Center in Arlington, Vt., the Five Town Health Alliance in Bristol, Vt., and the Gifford Medical Center in Randolph, Vt. The Bennington, Addison and Orange county centers will become the newest in the state thanks to $2.4 million in federal funding released last month.

The eight current Federally Qualified Health Centers already provide primary and dental care along with mental health counseling and low-cost prescription drugs to more than 130,000 patients.

The three new centers will bring the total number of Vermonters served to about 163,000, more than one in four people in the state and one of the highest participation rates in the country. In addition, about 25,000 Vermonters now receive dental care at community health centers, a number which will also rise.

http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/recent-business/a-health-care-success-story