Monitoring the Workforce Outcomes of North Carolina Medical School Graduates: Retention In State and in High Need Geographic Areas and Specialties

Authors: Evan Galloway, Erin Fraher, Nathan Tarr, Catherine Moore, Hugh H. Tilson Jr.

In 1993, the General Assembly required the University of North Carolina’s Board of Governors to submit an annual report to the legislature on the number of North Carolina (NC) medical school graduates going into primary care. Since 1994, the Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (“Sheps Center”) and the NC Area Health Education Centers program (AHEC) have collaborated to produce this report which tracks the number of students practicing primary care in rural NC five years after graduation from an NC medical school. As a result of the legislative mandate, NC is a national model for tracking medical student outcomes.

The latest report summarizes the Sheps Center’s analysis of the workforce outcomes for physicians who graduate from the state’s five medical schools, including whether they practice in North Carolina, in rural areas, in high-need specialties, and in NC safety net settings¹ five years after graduation.