The economic effect of a physician assistant or nurse practitioner in rural America.
Revenues generated by physician assistants (PAs) and NPs in clinics and hospitals create employment opportunities and wages, salaries, and benefits for staff, which in turn are circulated throughout the local economy. An input-output model was used to estimate the direct and secondary effects of a rural primary care PA or NP on the community and surrounding area. This type of model explains how input/output from one sector of industry can be the output/input for another sector. Given two example scenarios, a rural PA or NP can have an employment effect of 4.4 local jobs and labor income of $280,476 from the clinic. The total effect to a community with a hospital increases to 18.5 local jobs and $940,892 of labor income.
Fred C. Eilrich is a project analyst for the National Center for Rural Health Works at Oklahoma State University in Stillwater, Okla. The author discloses that this research was funded by a grant from the US Department of Health and Human Services' Health Resources and Services Administration, Federal Office of Rural Health Policy.
Fred C
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Eilrich
D004651:Employment; D006801:Humans; D007182:Income; D009722:Nurse Practitioners / Q000191:economics*; D010823:Physician Assistants / Q000191:economics*; D019035:Rural Health Services / Q000191:economics*; D012424:Rural Population; D014481:United States