GNYHA recently met with the Office of the Surgeon General (OSG) to review GNYHA’s advocacy priorities to strengthen the physician workforce as well as to discuss a recent Surgeon General Advisory that highlights a current public health issue.
The OSG recently released Addressing Health Worker Burnout: The U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory on Building a Thriving Health Workforce, in which Surgeon General Vice Admiral Vivek H. Murthy, MD, called on stakeholders to address the crisis facing physicians and other team members as the health care delivery system transitions from the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Advisory requested policies to promote access to mental health and substance use services, reduce administrative and other workplace burdens, and increase the supply of health care workers. The Advisory also called on the government to increase graduate medical education (GME) positions and build on recent efforts to increase the Medicare GME caps that have been in place for more than 20 years.
GNYHA thanked the Surgeon General for highlighting Medicare’s cap on the number of resident physicians it will fund. GNYHA continues to vigorously advocate on Capitol Hill for Congress to lift the cap. GNYHA also reviewed its ongoing programming to support member hospital efforts to implement strategies to promote clinician wellbeing.