Except for one month in fiscal year 2015 the Texas Medical Board licensing staff saw record numbers. Many still point to tort reform as the driver for the increase in physicians moving to the state, others point to the population growth in the state and still others link the increase to the economic growth in the healthcare sector. One very interesting article has been produced by the Texas Alliance for PatientAccess http://www.tapa.info/refuting-the-critics.html. One part of the article holds some great truth –
ALLEGATION: Texas is not adding physicians in rural Texas any faster than we were during the liability crisis years.
THE TRUTH: False.
Rural Texas was losing physicians per population during the liability crisis years. Today, those numbers are on the upswing. Since the passage of reforms, fifty-nine rural counties have added at least one emergency medicine physician. Thirty-one rural counties have added an obstetrician. Twenty-four rural counties have added a cardiologist and seven have added an orthopedic surgeon. The rural gains are not simply a bi-product of population growth. For instance, forty rural counties that did not have a single emergency medicine physician in 2003 now do. Fifteen rural counties that lacked a cardiologist and thirteen counties that lacked an obstetrician now have one.
Take the time to read the entire article.