CALIFORNIA OB/GYN ADVOCATES FOR EXPANDED SCOPE FOR APRNs

Please take a moment to read the comments by a California OB/GYN regarding APRNs. An interesting read….

You can read the complete opinion piece here: https://calmatters.org/commentary/my-turn/2020/08/legislature-should-acknowledged-nurse-practitioners-value-and-remove-restrictions/

By Matthew S. Schechter, Special to CalMatters
Dr. Matthew S. Schechter is a board certified OB/GYN and works as an obstetric hospitalist and HPV specialist in Oakland, Dr.Matthew.Schechter@gmail.com.

Does it make sense to restrict patient access to primary care nurse practitioners during a pandemic? The answer is obvious.

Yet that is what the California Legislature will do if Assembly Bill 890 fails to pass.

We live in a time of medical scarcity – shortages of tests, masks and ventilators across the state. Most worrisome during a pandemic: a shortage of health care providers able to meet the surge of Californians who will need care in the coming years.

The provider shortage is not new, but it has grown dramatically in recent years. While the Affordable Care Act cut the uninsured population in half, the workforce did not keep pace with growth. Over the last decade, the number of primary care providers per insured Californian went down by one-third. Thanks to the nightmare of COVID-19, in the coming months we’ll have an unprecedented need for frontline providers.