A group of national health care leaders has come together to address the growing problem of nurse and physician shortages.

According to Richard “Buz” Cooper, MD and Linda Aiken, PhD, RN, co-chairs of the newly created Council on Physician and Nurse Supply, the U.S. may lack as many as 200,000 physicians and 800,000 nurses by the year 2020. “By training more doctors and nurses now,” they said, “it may be possible to avert long waiting times for routine health care and remedy the understaffing of hospitals.”

The Council is based in the University of Pennsylvania’s Consortium for Health Workforce Research and Policy, a joint program of the Schools of Nursing and Medicine and the Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics. It is supported by AMN Healthcare®, San Diego, the nation’s largest health care staffing organization.

The Council will monitor data and act as an advocate for change, advising legislators and others on ways that the supply of nurses and physicians can be altered to meet the public’s needs. Its goals are to bring objectivity to the study of physician and nurse supply and to shape public policy. It is the only multidisciplinary organization in the nation dedicated exclusively to addressing issues of nurse and physician supply.

“This Council enters at an important time in the evolution of health care,” said Susan Nowakowski, President and CEO of AMN Healthcare. “The health care industry needs a clear, convincing voice calling for solutions to this growing problem. We are pleased to support efforts of some of the best thinkers in the nation to solve this problem.”

In addition to Cooper and Aiken, who are professors at the University of Pennsylvania, the Council’s members include James Bentley, Senior Vice President for Strategic Policy Planning at the American Hospital Association; Peter Budetti, MD, JD, Chair of the Department of Health Administration and Policy at the College of Public Health of the University of Oklahoma; David Blumenthal, MD, MPP, Director of the Institute of Health Policy at the Massachusetts General Hospital; Joyce Clifford, PhD, RN, President and CEO of The Institute for Nursing Healthcare Leadership, Robert Graham, MD, Professor of Family Medicine at the University of Cincinnati; John Iglehart, Founding Editor, Health Affairs; William Jessee, MD, President and CEO of the Medical Group Management Association; Michael Johns, MD, Executive Vice President for Health Affairs at Emory University; Kathleen Long PhD, RN, Dean of the College of Nursing at the University of Florida; Barbara Ross-Lee, DO, Vice President of Health Sciences and Medical Affairs, New York Institute of Technology; Marla Salmon, ScD, RN, Dean of Emory University School of Nursing; Boston; Ralph Snyderman, MD, Chancellor Emeritus at Duke University; and Michael Whitcomb, MD, Editor-in-Chief, Academic Medicine. Supporting members are Ms. Nowakowski and James Merritt, senior executives of AMN Healthcare®/The MHA Group.

At its first meeting, which is being planned for October 2006 at the University of Pennsylvania, the Council will examine a range of domestic and international issues that must be addressed as the U.S. attempts to better align its health care workforce with its future health care needs.

For more information contact:

Phillip Miller
The MHA Group
469-524-1420
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Joy McIntrye
University of Pennsylvania
215-898-5074
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it