We were touted as being heroes during the pandemic. I think we need to ride that story out a little bit more.

Dr. Dark: One thing that our readers want to talk about is the emergency medicine workforce report that came out a couple of years ago. The data were coming from the pre-pandemic phase and I think there’s been a lot of changes to the assumptions that go into making predictions. Do you think that it’s something that ACEP needs to redo in the post-COVID phase when these assumptions may have changed?

Surrounded by her extended family and friends, Dr. Aisha Terry started her term as ACEP President at the 2023 Council Meeting in Philadelphia. (Click to enlarge.)

Dr. Terry: We know that the variables have changed for sure. Workforce is about, again, supply and demand. When that original study was done, it was based on variables that have changed. We’re seeing more residency programs come into the mix, which of course impacts the formula. We also know that the attrition rate for emergency physicians has changed. That original study was based on there being about a three percent attrition rate. We have looked at the data again in 2022, and the attrition rate is now up to about four to 4.5 percent. And some estimate that the attrition rate could be as high as seven percent.

We know that we’re seeing increasing numbers of nurse practitioners and physician assistants practicing in emergency departments alongside physicians. That is another variable that goes into the mix in terms of workforce relative to supply and demand. We actually have talked about taking another look at that workforce data, plugging in the new variables, seeing how it’s going to impact the prediction. Even a year ago, the prediction of the amount of surplus in terms of number of emergency physicians had actually decreased by about 65 percent compared to the original predicted surplus.

Dr. Dark: In recent years we’ve seen several ACEP leaders representative of several minority groups. Just considering recent ACEP presidents, there is representation from women, Asian, and Black communities. What is the College doing moving forward to maintain this kind of focus on diversity and equity efforts, especially considering the national milieu that’s changed over the past year?

Dr. Terry: The College actually made diversity, equity, and inclusion a very specific initiative and priority several years back with the development of a Diversity Task Force. And from that task force’s efforts, we developed a committee around diversity, equity, and inclusion as well as a section within the College so that we have the assurance that there’s perpetuity in terms of this work. It has to be an ongoing commitment to really changing the fabric of the College and the culture of the College relative to a commitment around diversity, equity, and inclusion. One of the key pieces to ensure that we continue to have a diversity of leadership, again, goes back to that pipeline. We have to realize that actually only 39 percent of emergency physicians are women. We also know that about 35 percent of emergency physicians are from minority backgrounds in terms of race and ethnicity. That’s all of the non-Caucasian groups. There’s definitely some room there for us to enhance the pipeline relative to diversity. When we do that, we will see that shift into ongoing diversity at the leadership level within the College.