Like Doctors, More Nurse Practitioners Are Heading Into Specialty Care

If your doctor can’t see you now, maybe the nurse practitioner can.

Nurse practitioners have long been a reliable backstop for the primary-care-physician shortfall, which is estimated at nearly 21,000 doctors this year and projected to get worse.

But easy access to NPs could be tested in coming years. Even though nearly 90 percent of nurse practitioners are certified to work in primary care, only about a third choose the field, according to a recent study.

Source: Like Doctors, More Nurse Practitioners Are Heading Into Specialty Care – KFF Health News