Heart Surgeon Shortage Predicted

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When you punish good behavior, you will get less of it. (Obamacare and the federal raping of reimbursment schedules to surgeons.)
When you reward bad behavior, you will get more of it. (malpractice gone wild)
Until the population and the officials they elect value (and in our society that means financially) the investment, burden, and sacrifice heart surgeons and other surgical-specialty phyicians make on a daily basis, this society will continue face this shortage. The only problem is, when they realize what they've done, they won't be able to affect it for over a decade.
I don't blame CT surgeons for leaving the field. You reap what you sow. When you don't value something, it will disappear.

Dennis of CA 6:16PM February 06, 2012

"Emergency medicine"? Lifestyle? Paid more? I wouldn't want a CVT surgeon's problems, but I guarantee Emergency Medicine is no better. After doing EM for 17 years, the only grass browner than EM's is the hospitalists'.

Jeff Gibbons of NC 11:22PM September 29, 2011

I'm an American medical student, going into cardiac surgery because there's nothing better. I'm going to train in percutaneous procedures as well as heart surgery, and then proceed into a career that I love with knowledge of all aspects of the most current techniques for caring for the cardiac patient. We're changing valves now percutaneously, but only the surgeon knows the heart from the inside-out and I can't believe that a cardiac surgeon trained with a catheter cannot be as good or better than the alternative. Call me crazy, call me nieve, but I just don't believe all this pessimism will last. Heart disease is still the #1 killer worldwide, and that probably isn't going to change for a long time.

Jatin Anand of FL 4:10PM August 21, 2010

I trained under great duress and conyinued for another 20 years in private practice before I realised that the contract I made with society had been forfeited.Medicare has basically created a theft for services reimbursement scheme for cardiac surgeons. Most Cv surgeons are now paid extra by the hospitals they work in to keep them at the job. I quit and gave up using my hard earned skills because the punishment was heaped on (stress, long hours, threat of lawsuits,etc) and the rewards were removed. Most cardiac surgeons these days regret their career choice.

nelson of TX 1:31AM February 05, 2010

As Steven Reinberg, (Health Day, July 28, 2009), points out, a new study published in the highly regarded medical journal Circulation predicts that our country will face a serious shortage of cardiothoracic surgeons in the next 10 years. In fact the seeds for this looming shortage are already upon us.
With our aging population, demand for cardiothoracic surgeons is on the rise, while the number of available surgeons is declining. Nearly half of the cardiothoracic surgeons in the United States today are age 55 or over. Yet, over the last five years, there have been fewer applicants for training in this specialty so that 20 to 30% of the 130 available training positions have not been filled, and an even smaller number of those entering training are graduates of American medical schools. Those post-medical school trainees who might have been interested in becoming heart and lung surgeons are being deterred by high levels of medical school debt, the prospect of at least seven years of post-medical school residency training, progressively declining Medicare reimbursement, and the anticipated high stress and long hours required to fulfill their responsibilities to these patients. Several training programs for cardiothoracic surgeons have been forced to close because of the lack of trainees.
The cardiothoracic surgeon shortage is part of a larger surgeon shortage across the United States that encompasses multiple surgical specialties, rural areas, and some underserved urban areas. The shortage cannot be remedied overnight because it takes years to train new surgeons and decades to build a strong surgical residency program. With older cardiothoracic surgeons thinking about retirement and younger surgeons opting for other specialties, it is essential that any federal health care reform plan address the urgent needs for medical school debt relief and more equitable Medicare reimbursement, in order to ensure that patients continue to have adequate access to life-saving surgical care when they need it. Without enough surgeons, health care for Americans will be at risk for many years to come.
John E. Mayer, Jr., MD, FACS
Professor of Surgery, Harvard Medical School
Senior Associate in Cardiac Surgery
Children's Hospital, Boston

John E. Mayer, Jr., MD, FACS of MA 12:43PM August 03, 2009

The social experiment began several years ago with cardiothoracic surgery, and that same social experiment is happening now with medicine as a whole under the "OBAMA health reform". In the 1990's Heart surgeons trained the longest and were compensated appropriatley for that training and hard work. On average heart surgeons trained 10 years prior to going into practice, and continue to work longer hours than most physcians and those in the general population(Esp Politician and Bankers). With the reduction of surgeons fees well over 38%( more like 50%)Under DRG and RBRVS, fewer and fewer surgeons signed up for a job in which the demands are high,long hours and yes now less pay. Who would sign up for that? I would rather sign up to be a banker-Work fewer hours,paid with bonuses well over seven figures, and recieve a government bailout!
The social contract has forever changed in medicine and the smartest physician and individual will train in areas that are less demading with a greater reward. As for Dr Lee, he does not understand the market forces nore the changes of the social contract in which physians now want adequete compensation with better life styles. Translation: work less, get payed more! Such as with Emergency medicine, Dermatology,and plastic surgery

John Braxton of ME 11:19AM August 02, 2009