New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, R, proposed increasing aid to the state's Graduate Medical Education program by $30 million during his Feb. 28 budget address, according to The Inquirer.
The proposed increase would raise the total amount of state funding to $218 million, approximately 3.63 times the $60 million New Jersey contributed annually to the program before Gov. Christie's appointment, according to the report.
Gov. Christie's goal in increasing the funding is to "ensure that New Jersey residents have continued access to well-trained doctors and encourage those doctors to develop roots and make New Jersey their permanent homes," he said during his budget address, according to the report.
The proposal, however, does not require hospitals and health systems to create more spots for medical residents, one of the primary tactics hospitals use to bring physicians to the area. Though the number of hospitals offering medical residency programs rose from 2011 to 2015, health systems are still less inclined to create and offer such programs because they are expensive and cannot be sustained through hospital revenue alone. The New Jersey Hospital Association said teaching hospitals will receive $613 million in 2017 in federal and state subsidies — but those subsidies will only partially alleviate the $1.28 billion hospitals spend in teaching costs, according to the report.
While the funds will help hospitals and health systems slowly increase the number of physicians working in the state, Michael Geria, DO, director of medical education at Woodbury, N.J.-based Inspira Health Network, told The Inquirer increasing the number of residency positions may speed the process along, drawing physicians just beginning their careers and motivating them to stay in the state after completing their residencies, according to the report.
"It's a good recruiting tool. You train your residents, and hopefully they're going to stay in your hospital system," said Dr. Geria. "It's kind of like a three- or four-year job interview."