Legislation to improve Florida’s doctor shortage moves forward

TAMPA, Fla. - There’s a doctor shortage in Florida, and landmark legislation to address the crisis passed its final vote Thursday, heading now to Governor Ron DeSantis. 

State representatives overwhelmingly agreed that something needs to be done to help out Florida’s healthcare workforce through the Live Healthy Act, a more than $700M comprehensive healthcare package that deals with Florida’s doctor shortage and patient access to care.

"This is a monumental step forward for the state of Florida, the third-largest state in the country," said Mary Mayhew, the president, and CEO of the Florida Hospital Association.

Mayhew said key parts expand Medicaid reimbursement for births, the hospital at home program and funding residency slots.

"We know that where physicians train is where they are more likely to stay and practice," said Mayhew.

READ: Florida faces critical shortage of doctors and nurses, lawmakers looking for solutions

That’s something Dr. Victoria Selley looks forward to at AdventHealth’s Wauchula, Sebring and Lake Placid hospitals. 

 

"Every year, we have more and more folks moving here, but they don't always bring their physicians with them," said Dr. Selley, the vice president and chief medical officer at AdventHealth’s Wachula Sebring and Lake Placid campuses. "So, we know that we need to continue to train high quality physicians to be trained to provide primary care and other specialties, and they help them stay in our state of practice."

She said there’s a big impact for her patients with the legislation.

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"I practice in a more rural area. And so, for us, the increase in Medicaid for obstetrical patients is huge, greater than 50 percent on average. Our patients are Medicaid patients, and we are the only hospital in almost a three-county area that does mom and baby care," said Selley.

It also removes barriers for out of state and foreign doctors to practice in Florida, brings a telehealth minority maternity care pilot program statewide, expands mobile crisis response teams and more.

 

"Florida is completely disadvantaged in terms of the amount of federal funding we receive for graduate medical education, because the formula at the federal level is based upon the state's population Florida's population in 1997," said Mayhew. 

The state’s legislation tries to backfill and supplement the graduate medical education funding that Florida isn’t receiving from the federal government, Mayhew said.

Doctors like Selley said the Live Healthy Act sets Florida up with a better foundation.

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"We've been busy. It's the middle of winter, and I think this is the perfect time to provide that sort of silver lining and sunshine, if you will, the Sunshine State to know that there are some new programs and new possibilities coming our way," said Selley.

The action in the Florida House comes nearly a month after the state senate passed its version last month.

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