The American Hospital Association — a healthcare advocacy organization with 5,000 member hospitals, 270,000 affiliated physicians, 2 million nurses and 43,000 healthcare leaders — has penned a letter to the U.S. Senate to support the Medical Student Education Authorization Act.
The legislation would provide grants to public institutions of higher education to expand graduate education for physicians, specifically focusing on states with the most severe primary care shortages.
The COVID-19 pandemic has left several hospitals and health systems grappling with staffing shortages, making it hard to come by a qualified workforce.
"The ongoing staffing shortages, which contribute to the stress and burnout of care teams, along with the reliance on contract temporary labor, means our communities are being left vulnerable. Our nation simply does not have enough clinicians to care for patients today and not enough are in the training pipeline for the future," the AHA's May 4 letter reads.
In 2017, more than half of the U.S. nursing workforce was over the age of 50, with a major healthcare workforce retirement looming.
In 2022, nursing schools had to turn away nearly 80,000 qualified applicants due to a shortage of staff and training resources.
The bipartisan Senate bill would provide a needed remedy to the situation, according to the letter.