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UNDERSERVED

Recent trends

IN NEW PATIENT ACCESS TO

BEXAR COUNTY PHYSICIANS

By Adam V. Ratner, MD, FACR, and Brissa Vela

The Bexar County Medical Society (BCMS) has been collaborating with the Patient
Institute (PI) to ensure that physicians looking to expand their practices could be more
easily accessed by patients looking for new physicians. This ongoing effort is truly a
great benefit provided by these organizations to our community and to Bexar County
physicians.
The underpinning for this project is the physician database maintained by the staff
of the BCMS in collaboration with the Texas Medical Association and the PI. This
free, publically accessible database not only contains and publishes the specialties and
office contact information for Bexar County physicians, it also informs patients
whether physicians are accepting new patients in each of four categories: Medicare,
Medicaid, cash paying, and commercially insured.
New patients can access this database either via the Internet (Find a Doctor at
www.bcms.org) or by calling the BCMS main office phone number (301-4391). When
physicians join or renew their membership, they are queried about their acceptance of
new patients. If a physician decides to change status with respect to new patient ac-
ceptance, they are encouraged at any time to notify the membership staff of the BCMS.
In addition to acting as a conduit to bring physicians and patients together, the data-
base also provides an insight to medical socioeconomic trends in Bexar County. In
March 2011, when the baseline data was first collected, approximately 80 percent of
reporting physicians of all specialties were accepting new commercially insured and/or
cash-paying patients. At the same time, approximately 69 percent were accepting new
Medicare patients and 64 percent were accepting new Medicaid patients. Consistent
with the widely reported shortage of primary care physicians, fewer than two-thirds
of primary care physicians were accepting new patients regardless of funding source.
Fewer than half of primary care physicians reported accepting new Medicare and Med-
icaid patients at that time.
The most recent data (third quarter 2013) shows an increase in physician acceptance
of new patients compared with the early 2011 baseline. Across all specialties, 94 percent
of reporting physicians are accepting new commercially insured and cash-paying pa-
tients. Approximately three-fourths are accepting new Medicare patients and just below
two-thirds are accepting new Medicaid patients. For primary care specialties, the ac-
ceptance of new patients is now in line with the aforementioned aggregate of all physi-
cians in all categories except Medicaid, where only about half reported accepting new
Medicaid patients.
We rely on Bexar County physicians to help us deliver the best quality of care to
our community. Whether you are seeking to expand your practice or not, it is critically
important that the data is kept up to date. Please update your physician profile by
contacting Brissa G. Vela, BCMS director of membership, at 301-4371 or by email
to brissa.vela@bcms.org.

Adam V. Ratner, MD, FACR, is chairman of the board of directors of the
Patient Institute.

20 San Antonio Medicine • February 2014