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Notes -
It seems to me as someone who only uses the healthcare system but has friends who went into medicine that there is a huge fraction of medicine, mostly in general practice where we already have a shortage of doctors, that consist of handling the same dozen ailments over and over again. How much time do pediatricians spend diagnosing ear infections in kids and writing notes to send them back to school and prescriptions for amoxicillin? Or GPs asking the same lifestyle questions and giving the same advice ("quit smoking, lose weight, get more exercise"). The AMA cartel would have you believe that it takes years and years of specialization to handle this, but it seems that most of the front end stuff really can be handled by someone like an NP who knows those dozen ailments well, and most importantly when to ask for a more expert opinion.
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