Southeast Texas Medical Associates, LLP James L. Holly, M.D. Southeast Texas Medical Associates, LLP


Letters - NCQA PC-MH Penetration As of 2014
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To look at the penetration of PC-MH in the United States we make several assumptions:

  1. Including Internal Medicine, Family Medicine, and Pediatrics, there are 384,825 Primary Care providers in the United States.
  2. In 2014, NCQA reported that 8,112 practice sites had NCQA PC-MH Recognition which represented 40,841 individual providers.
  3. That meant that 2014, there was an average of 5 providers per practice site.
  4. For 2016, NCQA reported 11,547 PC-MH Recognized practice sites.
  5. Assuming an average of 5 providers per practice site, there are approximately 57,735 primary care providers working in NCQA recognized PC-MH practices.
  6. That represents 15% of primary care physicians working in PC-MH NCQA Recognized practice sites

*These numbers could change if any of the presuppositions are proved invalid.

**During the night (August 12, 2016), I thought about the above and realized that I overlooked a major premise. In 2014 and in 2016, NCQA PC-MH Recognition included Nurse Practitioners but it did not in 2010. 

I have no way of determining how many of the providers in the 2014 NCQA-published number of 40,842 or the estimated 2016 number of 57,735 are physicians and how many are Nurse Practitioners. Whatever the reality, its impact would be to diminish the percentage of primary care physicians participating in NCQA Recognized PC-MH practice sites.

Thus, the above summary over-estimates the NCQA PC-MH penetration.

James (Larry) Holly, M.D.
C.E.O. SETMA
www.jameslhollymd.com

Adjunct Professor
Family & Community Medicine
University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio School of Medicine

Clinical Associate Professor
Department of Internal Medicine
School of Medicine
Texas A&M Health Science Center

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