In the study, researchers used commercial health plan claims for more than one million Massachusetts residents from 2004 to 2005 to construct cost profiles for more than 12,000 physicians. Costs were evaluated across 600 types of episodes of care.
Compared to physicians with 40+ years of experience:
Physicians with less than 10 years of experience had 13.2 percent higher overall costs.
Physicians with 10 to 19 years of experience had 10 percent higher costs.
Physicians with 20 to 29 years of experience had 6.5 percent higher costs.
Physicians with 30 to 39 years of experience had 2.5 percent higher costs.
Researchers had some explanations for the higher cost of care. Recently trained physicians are more likely to be familiar with and use newer, more expensive treatments. Also, the lack of experience could lead to physicians providing more aggressive medical care.
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