This Brings the Total Commitment for the Health Plan’s Elevating the Safety Net Initiative to $255 Million
LOS ANGELES – The United States will face a physician shortage of up to 86,000 by 2036. That’s according to a report released earlier this year by the Association of American Medical Colleges. In 2018, L.A. Care Health Plan, the nation’s largest publicly operated plan, launched Elevating the Safety Net, an initiative designed to increase the physician workforce in clinics and practices that serve under-resourced communities – specifically Medi-Cal members – in Los Angeles County. This month, the L.A. Care Board of Governors approved an additional $50 million for the initiative, bringing the total commitment to $255 million.
“This initiative has helped to improve access to health care in L.A. County’s vulnerable communities,” said John Baackes, L.A. Care CEO. “The average medical school student graduates with about $227,000 in student loan debt. Physicians go into medicine wanting to help people, but that debt often pushes them into high-paying specialties rather than primary care. We are proud that Elevating the Safety Net has given doctors new options in L.A. County.”
Elevating the Safety Net offers grants to clinics and practices to use for salary subsidies, sign-on bonuses, and/or relocations costs for new, highly-qualified physicians recruited into the L.A. County safety net – those clinics and practices who provide health care regardless of a person’s ability to pay. The initiative also offers loan repayments to new physicians who commit to working in the L.A. County safety net for up to five years. And each year, the initiative provides eight full-ride medical school scholarships to students who have expressed an interest in serving underserved communities.
“Currently, there are 194 new physicians working in the L.A. County safety net thanks to the grants for salary subsidies, and 199 physicians have received loan repayment assistance. That assistance allows them to continue working in the safety net,” said Baackes. “We have also awarded 56 scholarships, with half of the students attending the Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science and half attending the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.”
Elevating the Safety Net furthers the health plan’s equity goal, as most of the physicians and future physicians benefitting from the investment have been racially and ethnically diverse, aligning with the racial and ethnic make-up of L.A. Care’s membership. Research indicates that provider concordance, where patients can choose the provider of the racial or ethnic background with which they feel the most comfortable, leads to improved health outcomes.
The initiative aligns with L.A. Care’s commitment to advancing health equity, which ensures that everyone has a fair and just opportunity to be as healthy as possible.