George Wright, PhD

Fax: 206.685.0401
E-mail: george.wright@glsynthesis.com

WWAMI Rural Health Research Center
University of Washington
Department of Family Medicine
Box 354696
Seattle, WA 98195-4696

Completed Projects

Do Community Health Centers Substitute for or Attract Private Rural Physicians?, Lead researcher
Research center: WWAMI Rural Health Research Center
Funder: Office of Rural Health Policy (ORHP)
Topics: Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs), Physicians

In What Types of Communities Do Rural Women Physicians Practice?, Lead researcher
Research center: WWAMI Rural Health Research Center
Funder: Office of Rural Health Policy (ORHP)
Topics: Physicians, Women, Workforce

Influence of Physician Competition on Health Care Utilization, Lead researcher
Research center: WWAMI Rural Health Research Center
Funder: Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF)
Topics: Health services, Physicians

Trends in Physician Location in Rural Towns in the U.S., 1980-95, Lead researcher
Research center: WWAMI Rural Health Research Center
Funder: Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF)
Topics: Physicians, Workforce

Publications

• How Many Physicians Can a Rural Community Support? A Practice Income Potential Model for Washington State
  Author(s): George E Wright, C Holly Andrilla, L Gary Hart
  Research center: WWAMI Rural Health Research Center
  Topics: Physicians, Workforce
  Report Number: No. 45
  Date: 04 / 2001
  Addresses the ability of smaller and underserved rural communities to financially support needed physicians. Reports on an experimental simulation model that projects potential practice income for primary care physicians in rural communities of Washington State. Finds that the distribution of physicians follows predicted economic potential. Surprisingly, the types of rural communities most likely to have fewer physicians are not small isolated towns, but larger communities with above average population growth, closer proximity to metro areas and somewhat lower average family incomes. Towns in HPSAs were predominantly constrained by demand deficits. To overcome demand barriers, continuous subsidies such as enhanced Medicare payments for certified Rural Health Clinics or 10 percent Medicare supplemental payments for care provided in a HPSA could be offered. Signing-bonus approaches may help overcome initial reluctance to practice in rural areas where demand is sufficient to support long-term retention.
• Improving the Quality of Outpatient Care for Older Patients with Diabetes: Lessons from a Comparison of Rural and Urban Communities
  Author(s): Roger A. Rosenblatt, Laura-Mae Baldwin, Leighton Chan, Meredith A. Fordyce, Irl B. Hirsch, Jerry P. Palmer, George E. Wright, L. Gary Hart
  Research center: WWAMI Rural Health Research Center
  Topics: Aging, Chronic diseases and conditions, Quality
  Citation: Journal of Family Practice, 50(8), 676-680
  Date: 08 / 2001
  Compares the quality of diabetic care received by patients in rural and urban communities in Washington State. Among the findings: Generalists provided most diabetic care in all locations. Patients living in small rural towns received almost half their outpatient care in larger communities. Patients living in large rural towns remote from metropolitan areas were more likely to have received the recommended tests than patients in all other groups. Patients who saw an endocrinologist at least once during the year were more likely to have received the recommended tests. Concludes that large rural towns may provide the best conditions for high-quality care-growing communities that serve as regional referral centers and have an adequate, but not excessive, supply of generalist and specialist physicians.
• Is Large Really Beautiful? Physician Practice in Small versus Large Scale Communities
  Author(s): George E. Wright, Ira Moscovice
  Research center: Minnesota Rural Health Research Center
  Topics: Health services, Physicians
  Report Number: Working Paper No. 56
  Date: 09 / 2005
  Examines the effect of community size on how physicians view their practices as reported by respondents to two waves (1996-97 and 1998-1999) of a national sample survey conducted as part of the Community Tracking Study (CTS). Results suggest that bigger is not necessarily better when it comes to physicians' perceptions of their practice. A key challenge is whether larger urban-based practices can be decomposed into smaller clinical microsystems that can benefit from the strengths of physician practices in small city or rural settings yet retain the presumed benefits of larger scale organizations.
• Rural Research Focus: Rural Physician Shortages
  Author(s): George E. Wright, C. Holly A. Andrilla, L. Gary Hart
  Research center: WWAMI Rural Health Research Center
  Topics: Physicians, Workforce
  Date: 05 / 2002
  Discusses a model for understanding how many physicians a rural community can support, based on research at the WWAMI Rural Health Research Center.