Nearly nine in ten rural counties lack a cardiologist and a new survey of the physicians serving the other 10% revealed that the issue runs deeper than who works where.
- Rural areas have 1.5x higher CVD mortality rates than urban ones.
- CV risk often grows with age, so helping patients means supporting (and retaining) cardiologists who can provide long-term care.
Thankfully, physicians have firsthand knowledge of what changes could improve rural care, leading three healthcare staffing companies to survey 227 rural healthcare professionals (168 clinicians and 59 administrators), with their answers emphasizing how crucial cardiology is to community health.
- About 17% of clinicians ranked cardiology as a high-impact specialty.
- Furthermore, 60% of respondents said losing community-level access to the specialty would cause significant consequences.
Now for some bad news: that doesn’t seem too far from the current reality.
- Just 8% of respondents said cardiology capacity was adequate.
- Nearly a quarter of respondents said their communities rely on alternative coverage from telehealth or temporary clinicians — or lack CV capacity completely.
- While demand is expected to grow, 40% said patients already have high unmet cardiovascular needs.
When a problem has so many causes, there’s a lot of room to find potential solutions. Nearly half of respondents championed growing the field and 24% prioritized protecting preexisting physicians. But how?
- Burnout’s an issue — rural communities have higher CV burdens and fewer clinicians, putting more load on individual cardiologists.
- Money’s another — rural cardiologists are paid similarly to urban ones, but they also lack financial and clinical support from hospitals, cath labs, and subspeciality physicians.
- About half of respondents would return for better support and a higher salary.
Not to mention the pipeline isn’t yet there for rural care. As cardiology ages, nearly all fellowships are concentrated in metropolitan medical centers.
While telehealth can help, it can’t fix the problem. At least 12M Americans don’t have the internet to support virtual visits, and nearly 90% of them are in rural areas.
- Still, AI might be able to shoulder some of clinicians’ burdens, especially with imaging and decision support.
The Takeaway
Care deserts have been a hot topic for years, but clinicians’ survey responses make it clear that the attention hasn’t helped close the care gap. Cardiology deserts aren’t likely to go away without a multi-pronged effort that understands and attends to the unique ecosystem of rural healthcare.
