What can you do?
The answer to this dilemna is education. Because this issue is bureaucratic in nature - the Federal government, the credentialing process, the state statutory laws - the necessary changes are very complex and daunting. Many of the people we have contacted have no clue about this travesty. If they do have any knowledge about this, it is usually incomplete. Many doctors and medical societies are aware of the residency shortage, however they are very unaware of the unintended consequences of this glitch.
Because of the disproportionate number of residency applicants, the system has had to adjust itself accordingly to be able to handle the onslaught of candidates. The current system will continue to select the top-scoring applicants and fail to discover the years of research, publications, volunteerism, additional education, etc. that the lesser scoring applicants have accomplished and included in their application. Most doctors we have contacted assume that the best candidates were selected and the others will just have to reapply next year. Except, next year will be even worse. In the meantime, the unmatched doctors will have to seek work elsewhere. So, education is the key!
You can help us by "educating" your state and U.S. lawmakers, medical associations, and media. You can also disseminate this cause to your colleagues and social media for their combined input and letters. No "single person" has the authority to solve the problem entirely. There must be a ground swell of voices to put it on the national agenda. This is what we hope to accomplish with this website.
Please find the list of potential contacts below as a starting point and contact the corresponding person/people in your state so that we can shed light on this terrible situation. Below you will see several documents which are letters that I have already sent. Feel free to copy, paste, and edit these letters and use them as your own!
- State Senators
- State Congressmen
- State Medical Association
- State Surgeon General
- State Board of Medicine
- Governors
- Health Editors of newspapers, television stations and radio as well as letters to the editor
- Social Media