Is The Future Of Medicine Primary Care?
Do you remember Dan Pink's book, A Whole New Mind?
Groundbreaking stuff from just a few years ago, that's withstood the test of time.
- A new, larger segment of the economy, based on right-brain creative and innovative activities? Check.
- Increased outsourcing to overseas talent as digital communications break down walls? Oh, absolutely Check.
That's already happening in medicine, with medical tourism -- notably, to the wonder clinics in Thailand. And as Dr. Davis Liu points out in his article, it's even happening with radiology interpretations, with the images being beamed out to be read in Australia and India, for 1/3 our cost.
Do globalization and tech translate into primary care medicine becoming THE most solid career choice for future doctors?
Maybe. There's only so much you can ship overseas, and travel is still kinda pricey. Someone will have to manage everything that you can't ship out, or manage by e-consult -- the primary care docs, Dr. Liu posits.
Pink argued that you want to get thee hence, pronto, to a line of work that isn't easily replaceable, via technological advance and global outsourcing. That has invaluable, unmatchable experience on the ground that simply can't be appreciated or implemented somewhere else.
Essentially, that can't be rendered down into a commodity to be bargained down, or digitized and handed off.
I'm just not sure that primary care medicine entirely fits that bill -- much of what PCPs do can be done more cheaply by nurse practitioners and physician assistants, and so is subject to commoditization forces. But if PCPs evolve, they can also take on tasks that were previously in the purview of specialists, so it's kind of a wash.
There's no substitute for reliable, capable eyes and hands on the ground; there will always be a niche, and a demand, and a need, for primary care physicians.
If we can just get the word out to med students, who have been running in the opposite direction for years, and survive the next few transitional years where the medical demand outstrips the PCP supply, we ought to be just fine.
