A study of a group of community health clinics in the OCHIN Network found that only 43% of patient specialty care referrals were successfully completed between October 2022 and September 2023. This means patients did not receive necessary follow-up care more than 57% of the time. Even when patients booked a referral appointment, they were forced to wait an average of 73 days for access to a gastroenterologist, 62 days for a cardiologist, and 54 days for a behavioral health specialist.
On top of that, an OCHIN analysis found that the average general wait time to see a specialist increased from 50 days in 2019 to 58 days in 2023. The problem is only getting worse.
The OCHIN network referred to here consists mainly of free or sliding-scale public health agencies.
I am very glad they are here…..but they have no insurance network generally, and many of their patients are uninsured. Medical specialists generally cannot afford to see these patients.
Medicaid (where it exists) pays very low fees to specialists.
So the headline here about “being like Canada” is a little misleading. Middle class Americans and virtually all seniors do not have long waits as a rule.