Critical care workforce.
OBJECTIVE
The recent Health Resources and Services Administration report on critical care manpower details the impending crisis in the critical care workforce in the United States.


METHODS
A review of the Health Resources and Services Administration statistics indicate the present structure for training critical care physicians through combined pulmonary/critical care fellowships is, and will remain, woefully inadequate to meet demand.


METHODS
Training for intensive care unit physicians will require new paradigms for training, including consideration of free-standing critical care residencies and multidisciplinary critical care fellowships.


CONCLUSIONS
Unless the training structure changes, the worsening shortage of intensivists will precipitate a crisis, resulting in the disintegration of critical care delivery in the United States.
Krell
Kenneth
K
Division of Critical Care, Department of Medicine, Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center, Idaho Falls, ID, USA. kenkrell@datawav.net
D002568:Certification; D003422:Critical Care / Q000639:trends; D006801:Humans; D007388:Internal Medicine / Q000193:education; D010820:Physicians / Q000600:supply & distribution*; D015272:Pulmonary Medicine / Q000193:education; D014481:United States; D014488:United States Health Resources and Services Administration / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D000078329:Workforce