Original articleThe dermatology work force: A focus on urban versus rural wait times
Section snippets
Methods
In November 2007, a list of 319 board-certified dermatologists from Ohio was obtained from the American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) World Wide Web site that includes data on 96% of dermatologists practicing in the United States.11 Using a uniform script, telephone calls were made to each of the 319 dermatologist's offices in Ohio by a single person (E. U.) posing as a new patient with a changing mole to determine the wait time until the next available appointment. A second telephone call was
Results
Using 2005 US Census Bureau data and the list of 319 dermatologists from the AAD World Wide Web site, there are 2.8 dermatologists per 100,000 people in Ohio.14, 15 Of the 319 dermatologists, only 250 practice medical dermatology whereas 69 dermatologists were excluded from our analysis for various reasons (Fig 2). Of the 250 practicing medical dermatologists, 6.8% were not accepting new patients at the time of the study.
The average wait time was 4.5 weeks and 3.1 weeks for a new and
Discussion
The wait times for an urgent dermatologic problem in this study are similar to wait times for routine appointments reported in other studies (average range 36-40 days). These data suggest that the current number of dermatologists in Ohio (2.8 dermatologists/100,000 population) is inadequate to meet the public need.4, 5, 6, 7 Excluding specialty dermatologists and those not in active practice, only 2.2 dermatologists per 100,000 population are available to provide care for a patient with a
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Funding sources: None.
Conflicts of interest: None declared.