A coalition of hospitals has been formed to urge the New Jersey Legislature to fully fund graduate medical education in New Jersey's teaching hospitals. The coalition is being led by the New Jersey Council of Teaching Hospitals who has been working to fix the fractured state of our hospitals due to the lack of support from the currently proposed budget. We ask you to join our fight to save New Jersey residents.
New Jersey does not have enough doctors to treat its citizens. Instead of fixing this problem, the State Legislature and Governor Corzine want to reduce funding to the programs that train doctors!
The Legislature cannot allow the implementation of the Governor's proposed cuts to Graduate Medical Education Funding. The health care system in New Jersey is already fractured and these cuts will only harm the currently fragile state of New Jersey hospitals. Access to services is vital to the citizens of New Jersey.
Statistics show that doctors generally start practices in the state in which they receive their training or residency. It only makes sense that if New Jersey teaching hospitals are forced to reduce their number of residencies that the doctor shortage will only get worse.
It is very expensive to train good doctors. It costs about $175,000 to train each resident physician.
Graduate Medical Education Funding or "GME" is the term used by the State Legislature and hospitals to refer to money used to train doctors. Last year GME funds were cut by $60 million. The Governor has proposed to decrease the Medicaid GME fund by $8 million.
The Federal Government understands the need for doctor training and gives to each state a dollar for dollar match for any amount of money dedicated to GME. Cutting funding at the New Jersey level also cuts the amount of money received by the Federal Government.
There currently are not enough primary care physicians in New Jersey to serve the needs of it's residents. The areas that do not meet the necessary number of physicians include family practice, pediatrics, and OB/GYN.
WE NEED YOUR HELP! A coalition of hospitals is urging the New Jersey Legislature to fully fund graduate medical education in New Jersey's teaching hospitals. The Legislature cannot allow the implementation of the Governor's proposed cuts. Access to services is vital to the citizens of New Jersey.
Visit our TAKE ACTION page to find out how you can help.
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