Senior Data Analyst AMA Center for Health Equity University of California Davis Chicago, Illinois, United States
Proposal: The AMA’s Physician Professional Data, formerly known as the Physician Masterfile, has been used in academic literature to explore questions related to physician supply, practice patterns, and patient outcomes. Methodological strengths and weaknesses of the data are established, but to date, no research has examined its utilization using an equity lens. This presentation acknowledges how the Physician Professional Data was historically used to perpetuate harm against Black physicians and also reviews how the dataset was used across four decades of published research. We use a systematic review approach to identify literature gaps related to health equity research with the goal of informing future use of the Physician Professional Data.
The 121 included articles demonstrate an increase in Physician Professional Data utilization following the 2010 enactment of the ACA, the nation’s largest commitment to equitable health care in recent history, especially by land-grant institutions. Journals publishing works featuring the Physician Professional Data frequently center the ‘social mission’ of medicine, including primary care practice, physician workforce diversity, and care for groups historically marginalized in health care. The outcomes explored vary, with most focusing on workforce outcomes (supply, distribution, or specialty selection), medical education evaluation, practice patterns, and patient outcomes. The body of literature demonstrates a long-standing commitment to equitable healthcare, however, the means by which those aims were conceptualized reflect national discourse at the time of composition and may be limited by today’s standards. While many articles explore access to care, workforce diversity, health inequities (usually described as disparities), few articles conceptualize health equity as it is understood today. While the Physician Professional Data is positioned to support health equity research, improvements are needed to support the next generation of equity-centered health workforce research, including improved access to race and ethnicity data, more robust location data, and greater detail on physician practice.
Mallory L. Niemzak Johnson, MPA will present. Ms. Johnson is senior data analyst with the AMA Center for Health Equity and a current PhD candidate in Medical Geography at the University of California, Davis. She contributes over a decade of work experience as a health systems researcher in medical schools, research consulting, and health care organizations.
Learning Objectives:
Upon completion, participants will be able to describe the AMA's Physician Professional Data (PPD, formerly known as the Physician Masterfile), its purpose, and its history.
Upon completion, participants will be able to describe how historically the PPD was used to perpetuate harm against Black physicians.
Upon completion, participants will be able to describe how the PPD has been used in published research, including research to advance health equity.
Upon completion, participants will be able to describe proposed updates to the PPD which would enable the next generation of health workforce and health equity research.
