0:00

My

0:02

condition, it just keeps getting

0:04

worse and worse. For sufferers of

0:07

minor or acute condition, life

0:09

can be difficult. You're telling me.

0:12

But new clinically proven Crumpandola

0:14

can relieve the worst symptoms of condition.

0:16

You mean there's something that can help? Thank

0:19

God. So talk to your doctor about Crumpandola.

0:22

My doctor? Yeah, I don't have

0:24

one of those. Side effects may be severe, so

0:26

tell your doctor if you have signs of dementia.

0:29

Unusual growth, trouble breathing,

0:31

bloody teeth, or stigmata. I

0:34

don't have a doctor. I don't know anyone

0:36

who has a doctor. I've tried to find a doctor.

0:39

Condition

0:39

is bad, but Crumpandola

0:41

can help. I'm sure it can. Tell your doctor today.

0:43

But I don't have a doctor. Crumpandola is not

0:45

a real drug and that was a fake ad, but have you heard about how America

0:47

is running low on doctors and how all sorts of players are

0:50

stepping in to tend to patients like CVS, surely, but

0:52

also Walmart, which I guess kind of makes sense, but Dollar General,

0:54

really, and Best Buy, where I used to buy System of a Downs in

0:56

these? That's all I had on today. Explain terms and conditions

0:58

apply.

0:59

I'm Jonquelyn Hill and this

1:01

week on The Weeds, a growing piece

1:03

of the care crisis. It used to be that

1:05

there could be seven people to take care of each person

1:08

and that number is going down and down and down. So

1:10

that has impacts for the people who need care and

1:13

has impacts for the people who are giving that care too. Millions

1:16

of Americans are caretaking for children

1:18

and aging loved ones at the same time. Why

1:21

it's difficult to bridge multiple care gaps and

1:24

the policies that could fix it. Listen

1:26

and subscribe.

1:33

Returning this November in Los Angeles, Vulture

1:35

Festival is a pop culture spectacle where

1:38

Vulture, the website, not the bird, comes

1:40

to life right before your eyes.

1:43

This year we're celebrating even more of the art

1:45

that unites us. Comedy, reality,

1:48

TV, film, music, and more.

1:51

Join us for intimate panels, performances,

1:53

and conversations with iconic stars

1:55

like Weird Al, Henry Winkler, Meg

1:57

Stalter, Casey Wilson, Sharon Hicks, and more.

1:59

Aaron Stone, Adam Pally, Billy

2:02

Porter, Matt Rogers, and many more

2:04

to be announced. It's all happening the weekend

2:07

of November 11th and 12th, and we

2:09

can't wait to see you there.

2:11

For tickets, lineup announcements, and more, visit

2:13

vulturefestival.com. I

2:25

explained, I'm Sean Ramos from, I mostly try

2:27

to avoid doctors, had a bad experience,

2:29

but I recently tried to get my

2:32

once a decade checkup, and getting

2:34

an appointment with a new physician was tough. It

2:37

was like trying to get into New York's hottest

2:39

club tough. Dylan Scott

2:41

covers healthcare at Vox, and he's been having a tough

2:44

time too. Yeah, I mean, your

2:46

story is not unique, I am sad

2:48

to say. My family has gone through the

2:50

exact same thing. My wife in particular has

2:53

been trying to find a new primary

2:55

care doctor for like the last year, and

2:57

first of all, there just weren't that many who were accepting

3:00

new patients, and second of all, once, a

3:02

couple of times when she did actually have an appointment

3:04

scheduled, it ended up getting canceled, and she had to

3:06

kind of start from scratch. And it's not just

3:08

Dylan and me in and around

3:10

DC. We asked you about

3:12

your experiences, and they reflected ours.

3:16

Yeah, my name is Mindy, and I'm from Arvada,

3:18

Colorado. Both my

3:20

wife and I,

3:22

we just really can't find a primary

3:24

care at all. My name is Macy,

3:27

I live in Columbus, Ohio. I

3:30

knew I was turning 26, and

3:32

was going to lose health insurance

3:35

from my parents, so six

3:37

months in advance, I started to

3:40

make all of my preventative and annual

3:42

appointments. A lot of

3:45

offices in the Columbus area were

3:48

full up to nine to 12 months,

3:50

so I was not able to

3:52

get into a lot of my appointments prior to

3:54

losing insurance, and

3:56

that's just preventative and annual

3:58

stuff.

3:59

take a look at the data, like those

4:02

kinds of experiences are not that unusual.

4:05

The number of Americans who say that their primary

4:07

source of medical care is actually like a personal

4:10

physician, one person that they go back

4:12

to again and again, those numbers

4:14

have been declining. And especially for younger patients,

4:17

about half of people under 30 say

4:19

they do not have a primary care

4:22

doctor. About one in four people

4:24

say they don't have any regular source

4:26

of health care in the United States and that number

4:28

has been growing. Primary care, what was

4:30

once kind of the foundation

4:33

of American medicine and of people's

4:35

relationship to the health care system, has

4:38

really been getting squeezed for decades

4:40

now and I think patients especially are

4:42

starting to feel that squeeze. We asked

4:44

Dylan what primary care looked like back when

4:46

it was the foundation of American

4:48

medicine. If

4:51

you lived in a small town, there was a primary

4:53

care doctor and they ran their own practice.

4:56

They were in charge, they employed themselves,

4:59

you'd go see them for your checkups, for

5:01

sick visits. If you went to the hospital,

5:03

they'd probably go to the hospital with you and admit

5:06

you and oversee your care there.

5:09

That's when the family doctor, the primary

5:11

care doctor had this place of primacy

5:14

in the American health care system. And

5:16

when does it start to go south? In the

5:18

early 80s. Hell

5:21

yeah! Some

5:26

important things started to change with

5:28

the overall health care system around

5:30

that time. Some of the big ones

5:32

are hospital systems were growing,

5:36

they were looking for new revenue opportunities

5:39

and so they identified like, alright, we're providing

5:41

all this inpatient care, performing surgeries,

5:43

delivering babies, fixing broken bones, whatever.

5:46

But there's this whole other swath

5:48

of the health care industry, primary care,

5:51

outpatient visits, where there's

5:53

even more money to be made. Hell

5:55

yeah! Like back, you know, 30, 40 years

5:57

ago, most of the were

6:00

self-employed, something like three, four, some

6:02

doctors were running their own business.

6:04

They were entrepreneurs as much as physicians.

6:07

But these days, and just in the last couple years, we've

6:09

reached a milestone where actually,

6:12

most doctors and most primary care doctors

6:15

are now employed by somebody else. They work

6:17

for a hospital or maybe

6:19

a larger system of clinics, what

6:21

have you, but that's been a real change. We've gone

6:23

from the sort of like, the independent

6:26

doctor to primary care doctors who are now

6:28

just kind of cogs in the system.

6:31

And I think that has led to, you know, less

6:33

of a personal relationship between patients and their

6:35

doctors. And I know that doctors in

6:37

the field are really concerned about that.

6:39

Hi, this is Pamela Root, and

6:41

I'm coming from Vermont. And

6:44

I work with a lot of elderly people who

6:47

have had unbelievable

6:49

problems with trying to

6:51

get things resolved with

6:52

doctors and appointments.

6:54

And it just seems

6:56

that privatized these

6:58

big investment companies that own all

7:00

these hospitals and medical

7:03

facilities, they would

7:06

rather not deal with doctors.

7:08

Why does this consolidation though, lead

7:11

to the shortage that you're describing?

7:13

It's a combination of a few different things. It is

7:15

partly consolidation, like health systems

7:17

absorb these primary care practices. And

7:20

you know, their directive to the doctors

7:22

is like, you need to see as many

7:24

patients as possible. And so that gives,

7:26

you know, because the way primary care doctors

7:28

are paid or their health systems are paid for

7:31

their services is largely

7:33

fee for service. Like you have an appointment,

7:36

you order a test, volume is

7:38

king. You need to be doing as many different services

7:40

as possible. Hello, my name

7:42

is Debbie Kennedy, calling

7:44

you from Salem,

7:45

Oregon, which is a medical

7:48

wasteland. This has become universal

7:50

throughout the city here to

7:52

just give people 15 minutes

7:55

of your time if they have an appointment

7:57

with you.

7:57

And that's not their fault. That's the fault.

7:59

of whoever's run in the clinic.

8:02

Obviously from a hospital's perspective, they

8:04

want to bring in money, but they also want to minimize

8:07

their overhead. So they're going to only hire as many

8:09

primary care doctors, you know, as they

8:11

think is worth their while, but not more. And

8:14

because, you know, hospital systems

8:16

are often so dominant in their local healthcare

8:18

markets, that can make it a lot harder for

8:20

another doctor to set up an independent practice.

8:23

Hello, my name is Saraya.

8:25

I'm from Houston, Texas.

8:27

We also are suffering the

8:29

healthcare shortage. Essentially we

8:31

have hospitals where people

8:33

are jumping from hospital to hospital, depending

8:35

on who is offering the bonus. But we

8:38

just don't have enough providers

8:40

to fill all of the positions.

8:42

The other part of it that I think is really important is

8:44

like from a medical training

8:46

perspective, and from an economic

8:49

perspective, you can make a lot more money

8:51

if you train to be an orthopedic surgeon or

8:54

do some kind of other medical specialization.

8:56

You potentially could make like twice as much

8:59

money. We have this system of

9:01

medical training where Medicare is responsible

9:03

for setting up residency programs

9:06

so that doctors and training can actually practice

9:09

in the field for a few years after medical school.

9:11

And the number of slots that are devoted

9:14

to primary care has not been sufficient

9:16

for a long time, according to people who look

9:18

at these workforce issues. So we're both

9:20

not like creating enough primary

9:23

care doctors, in our medical

9:25

training pipeline. We're not giving

9:28

aspiring doctors much of a financial

9:30

incentive to practice primary

9:32

care. And we've just made the prospect of

9:34

entering primary care in terms

9:37

of your work experience less appealing

9:39

because now you're just gonna be, like I said before,

9:41

a cog

9:42

in a larger hospital's machine. That's

9:45

why we're seeing these dwindling number of people

9:47

who are entering the primary care space. Yeah,

9:49

this is Daniel Blakely, and I was hospitalized

9:51

randomly for a hiking incident.

9:54

And when I got out of the hospital, was directed by

9:57

the emergency room doctors to contact my

9:59

primary.

9:59

to figure out my recovery.

10:02

When I got home, things did not get better. They

10:04

actually got worse and I kept trying to call my primary.

10:07

He never called me back, not once.

10:10

And it's kind of indicative of the healthcare

10:12

in San Luis Obispo, which is considered

10:14

a rural area. So it doesn't attract

10:16

doctors. I had to wait almost

10:19

a year to get my first visit with this doctor.

10:22

And now I'm having to wait almost the same time

10:24

to switch doctors because I just can't trust this

10:26

original doctor anymore. Where has

10:28

this doctor shortage felt

10:31

most profoundly? Rural areas

10:33

in particular experience the worst

10:36

shortages. And that's, you know, it does go back right

10:38

there to the economics. On

10:41

top of that, you know, there are like other considerations

10:44

when people are trying to decide where to work, right? Like

10:46

it's not just about like, you know, where's

10:48

there a job? It's like, what kind of community do I

10:50

wanna live in? Where might there be a job for my

10:52

partner? That kind of thing. And that continues

10:55

to tug more and more doctors towards

10:57

large population areas. But

11:00

if you kind of take a big step back, it's

11:02

not totally clear whether we don't

11:04

have enough doctors like overall.

11:07

Oh, the issue is less

11:10

that like we have an overall doctor shortage

11:12

and more that the doctors we have are

11:15

not very well distributed. We might

11:17

in theory have enough doctors.

11:19

What about the patients still? And we've been talking

11:22

about doctors, hospitals,

11:25

the industry, but what about

11:27

patient behavior? Has that

11:29

changed in a way that affects the shortage

11:32

or affects the ability

11:34

for patients to find doctors in any meaningful

11:36

way? It does seem that what has changed

11:39

is patients' expectations about how quickly

11:41

they should be able to access a doctor.

11:44

Hi, this is Jessica Starr. I'm calling

11:46

from Springfield, Massachusetts. Finding

11:49

a doctor has been insane. I

11:53

couldn't find anybody who

11:54

could take me in less

11:56

than six months. Now, I was

11:58

able to resolve this. by moving

12:00

to a

12:01

telemedicine doctor's office.

12:04

So now I have an app on my phone,

12:06

a doctor that I can just send

12:08

a message to at any point, which is really

12:11

great, but it also is kind of missing that

12:13

in-person touch.

12:17

And so there's this kind

12:19

of industry of alternative options

12:21

that has started to proliferate. Like we've seen

12:23

an explosion in the number of urgent

12:26

care clinics in the United States. You've

12:28

seen pharmacies like CVS

12:30

and Walgreens start to set up clinics in

12:32

their stores where people can

12:34

get at least like very basic healthcare

12:37

services and even get a physical,

12:39

get some of their vitals checked, that kind of thing. And

12:41

we're seeing other companies start to explore the space.

12:44

Like Walmart has pledged

12:46

to double its healthcare footprint. It's

12:48

become clear that sort of the traditional model

12:51

of primary care is broken, in

12:53

part because of issues on the supply

12:55

side that we've already talked about, but also because

12:57

of the demand side and consumers'

13:00

expectations about being able to see

13:02

their doctor whenever they want to see their doctor.

13:04

And so we're seeing these competitors pop

13:06

up and it's led to this

13:09

kind of inflection point for primary

13:11

care going forward.

13:20

Whether Big Box entering big medicine

13:23

is a good thing for little patients

13:26

when we're back on Today Explained.

13:39

Hi, I'm Abhishek Artsy and I'm one

13:41

of the people whose names you hear in the credits of

13:43

Today Explained. I helped produce

13:45

our recent series, Blame Capitalism, who

13:48

got into how companies became solely focused

13:50

on profit, how the bank bailout launched

13:52

populist movements on the left and the right, and

13:55

how amidst the climate crisis and growing

13:57

inequality, many of us lost faith in

13:59

capitalism. ability to meet our basic

14:01

needs. If you appreciate these kinds

14:03

of deeply nerdy, thoroughly researched, and

14:06

rigorously fact-checked conversations, then

14:08

please support our work at Vox.com

14:10

slash give. And thank you.

14:18

To all my podcast enthusiasts, it's

14:21

your boy, Andre Aguidala, alongside

14:23

my co-host, Evan Turner. We're

14:25

not just any podcast, we're former

14:27

NBA players with a story to tell. Get

14:29

ready to step into a world of captivating stories,

14:32

insightful conversations, and thought-provoking

14:34

discussions with our podcast, Point Forward.

14:37

We're talking to some of the most successful people

14:39

in all facets of life. That's right, my

14:41

people. Point Forward isn't just about sports,

14:44

it's about life, growth, and the journey to

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14:48

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Forward is a podcast for you. Don't

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15:17

♪ I'm the

15:17

doctor, give me the news. Doctor!

15:24

Okay, Today Explained is back with Dylan

15:26

Scott from Vox Dylan. You said that big pharmacy,

15:29

the Walgreens, the CVSs, were part of the reason

15:31

that patients are losing their patience, but

15:34

also maybe part of the reason that it's getting hard

15:36

to find a doctor. But I

15:38

just recently read that Rite Aid, one of these

15:41

big pharmacy outfits, is in financial

15:43

straits.

15:44

One of the country's largest pharmacy chains,

15:46

Rite Aid, has filed for

15:48

bankruptcy protection. What gives? Well,

15:51

I think the Rite Aid situation, it's unique. The

15:54

reasons that Rite Aid is citing for

15:56

preparing for bankruptcy is that it has

15:59

some long-standing... debt. It also

16:01

has some financial obligations

16:03

as a result of some of the opioid epidemic

16:06

settlements that have been made with state

16:08

and federal governments over the years here in

16:11

recent years. Fair. So I do think

16:13

that like it's not necessarily like a

16:15

sign that this business model is

16:17

going under. I think it's still important for the

16:19

subject that we've been discussing because like

16:22

these clinics, these Minute Clinics that are they're

16:24

largely run out of these big pharmacy chains

16:27

for some people for especially for people who

16:29

generally speaking don't have a lot of healthcare

16:32

access like that might be the most

16:34

obvious place for you to go to get basic medical

16:36

checkups to get your vaccines. Even

16:39

if these kinds of Minute Clinics aren't a perfect

16:42

replacement for like a personal physician,

16:45

they do provide healthcare for a lot

16:47

of people, particularly people who might

16:49

not have access to other kinds of healthcare.

16:51

If a Rite Aid goes under, which is

16:53

happening, who steps in? Is it just CVS

16:57

or Walgreens? Because I've heard like at least CVS

16:59

is shutting down stores all over the place too.

17:01

Yeah, you're right. The nation's largest pharmacy

17:03

chain is now planning to close as many

17:05

as 900 stores over the next three

17:07

years. That's about one tenth of its location.

17:10

Walgreens has said the same thing.

17:12

It comes after they failed to meet earnings

17:14

expectations and lost about 59% this year in

17:18

reported net

17:18

income. I think some of that is linked

17:21

more to just like the general struggle

17:23

of brick and mortar retail

17:25

right now. And part of the reason I think that

17:27

is that we do see other chains still

17:30

interested in getting into the healthcare

17:32

game. I think the most striking example

17:34

has been Dollar General.

17:37

Dollar General, the known dollar

17:39

store? The dollar store where you're

17:41

supposed to be able to go pick up like

17:44

your household cleaning supplies for a couple

17:46

bucks or whatever. Good luck.

17:50

Hi Besties, we are sitting outside of the Dollar

17:53

General and I'm about to take you in store and show you some deals

17:55

that you can do utilizing this coupon

17:57

right here, the 5-Off 25 Saturday Only

17:59

coupon.

18:00

They've become kind of omnipresent across

18:02

the country, again, particularly

18:04

in neighborhoods and communities

18:07

where there might not be a lot of other shopping

18:10

retail options. And so they

18:12

have identified healthcare as

18:14

a potential opportunity for expanding

18:17

their business. So can you get a colonoscopy

18:19

for a couple of bucks? We're

18:22

not there yet. They've been

18:24

taking baby steps. So first they

18:26

hired a chief medical officer a couple

18:28

of years ago and announced they were creating like a

18:31

healthcare advisory board to

18:33

kind of figure out like what would a dollar

18:35

general but for healthcare look

18:37

like? And so they've been slowly

18:40

ramping up over the last couple of years. Like for

18:42

one, they've just started to stock healthcare

18:45

products in their stores. And

18:47

then earlier this year, they started

18:50

piloting like mobile clinics that

18:52

would be held, you know, at the locations

18:54

of their retail stores. So they've

18:57

set up these like trailers, they've partnered

18:59

with a group called Docco, which is

19:01

like, you know, their whole business is providing

19:04

mobile health and transportation services.

19:07

And so in Tennessee, they had set up a handful

19:09

of these like mobile clinics to do a lot of the

19:11

same stuff that, you know, Walgreens and

19:13

CVS have been doing at their minute

19:15

clinics, you know, physicals, routine checkups,

19:18

vaccinations, lab testing,

19:21

even diagnostics like an EKG if

19:23

somebody comes in complaining about their heart, they

19:26

can do certain urgent care services like

19:28

you know, treating wounds, and

19:30

even help you know, people who have like

19:33

high blood pressure diabetes, you know,

19:35

get their vitals checked, and potentially

19:37

get prescribed any medication that they might

19:40

need. So I do think that that suggests that like, yes,

19:42

while while those marquee

19:44

pharmacy chains have had some business

19:47

struggles here of late, there are still

19:49

other franchises that see a real opportunity

19:51

in providing this basic kind of medical

19:54

care to people, particularly people who

19:56

might not have a personal physician, and

19:58

who are just looking for some kind of

19:59

option to get their basic medical needs mapped.

20:05

I've seen a pharmacy at the Walmart, Dollar

20:07

General's getting in the mix, how long is it until

20:11

Best Buy and TJ Maxx are

20:13

getting into the action? Well, it's funny you should

20:15

say that because Best Buy has begun

20:17

talking about offering telemedicine

20:19

services. I mean, that's another potential

20:21

opportunity here. That's another way in which primary

20:24

care may begin to evolve. Maybe you don't

20:26

have a doctor's office or even

20:28

a pharmacy nearby, but most

20:30

people can hop on their phone

20:33

or hop on a computer and talk to people

20:35

that way. Then this is happening across different

20:37

practices, not just in terms of what Best Buy is

20:39

trying to do. I'll make a confession

20:42

here, Sean. I got my physical.

20:45

At Best Buy? Not at Best Buy. At a normal

20:47

doctor, at a big hospital system, totally

20:49

part of all the trends that we were talking about

20:52

in our earlier segment. But my blood

20:54

pressure was a little high. And so they wanted

20:56

me to start monitoring it. And I

20:59

was able to get this blood pressure monitor for

21:01

my house that puts all the

21:03

information onto my phone and then I can

21:05

just send that as a digital message to

21:08

my doctor without ever going

21:10

in to see him. This is another way that

21:13

physicians are trying to make everything more convenient

21:15

for their patients because, like we said, patients don't

21:17

have the patience to wait to be

21:20

seen by a doctor like they used to. And

21:22

that's where I think these other companies, like Best Buy,

21:24

they're like, we have the entire infrastructure to

21:26

do this kind of stuff. Maybe

21:29

this is a way that we can get a piece of the

21:31

big healthcare pie that's an enormous

21:33

part of our economy. So at least they're having some

21:35

kind of contact with the healthcare system

21:38

rather than being cut out entirely.

21:40

Is there like a 1% equivalent to

21:42

what's going on on the more

21:45

middle class end of the spectrum

21:47

here? If Best Buy's getting in

21:50

and Dollar General's getting in, is

21:52

like Louis V gonna get in or something

21:54

to provide healthcare services? What's the 1% doing? Well,

21:57

I do think some of these like concierge

21:59

clinics. It's like one medical, which Amazon

22:01

acquired a couple of years ago. Like I think those

22:03

are a good example of what kind of the high class

22:06

version of this looks like. You

22:08

know, you have this clinic that's your home base,

22:11

you pay, you know, a monthly or annual

22:13

retainer to be like on their

22:15

patient roster. Basically, what that retainer

22:18

is supposed to give you is pretty much direct access to

22:20

your doctor whenever you want it. And that can either

22:22

be like you come in for checkups or maybe

22:25

for an acute medical visit. You

22:27

know, it should be really quick, really easy

22:29

to get an appointment. Or you might

22:32

like have your doctor's phone number and you can

22:34

like text them if you've got a question or you've got,

22:36

you know, you got one of these messaging portals. And

22:38

there's sort of an understanding that because you

22:40

pay basically to be a member of this

22:42

clinic, that you're going to get really, really

22:45

quick access. That's I think what kind

22:47

of the higher class version of this it looks

22:49

like, you know, a similar but distinct model

22:52

is known as direct primary care. And

22:55

it works on a similar business model where it's like

22:57

you pay, you know, a monthly or annual

23:00

fee to be a part of this practice. And

23:02

what that fee is supposed to get you is that direct

23:04

access to your doctor whenever you want it, that

23:07

kind of convenience that

23:09

patients I think feel like they've been losing from their

23:11

more conventional primary care

23:13

physician. How should

23:15

we feel about it, Dylan? I mean, it's easy to scoff

23:18

at like the dollar store getting involved

23:20

in health care, or maybe it's

23:23

a bit of a head scratch or to hear that like Best

23:25

Buy wants to provide you with,

23:27

you know, blood pressure checkups or whatever it might

23:29

be. But is this ultimately a good thing

23:32

that these big box stores and chains want

23:34

to step in and provide health

23:36

care in a country that apparently has

23:38

a bit of a shortage? This is an all

23:40

hands on deck situation. Fewer

23:42

and fewer Americans have our

23:44

usual source of health care, go

23:47

and see a doctor on an annual basis.

23:49

That's how we catch things early. That's how we

23:52

get ahead of things. And if we get ahead of things, that tends

23:54

to lead to better health care outcomes down

23:56

the road. And so like, while I

23:58

do think something is lost.

23:59

when you don't have that personal relationship

24:02

with an individual doctor, I still

24:04

think it's better for people to have a clinic

24:07

at their local pharmacy or to be

24:09

able to go to Donald General. It's clearly

24:12

a net good for healthcare access

24:14

in a general way that people now have

24:17

these options available to them. I think

24:19

the question right now is do these sort of alternative

24:21

models for providing primary care for people,

24:24

can they do at least a good enough job

24:26

of approximating what people would get

24:29

from a more conventional

24:29

primary care doctor that were

24:32

at least addressing their healthcare needs

24:34

and help preventing worse outcomes down the road. I

24:40

think if we want to look at the long term, how

24:42

do we kind of create a primary care

24:45

workforce that's big enough, that's

24:47

robust enough for our country that

24:49

is able to engage with people as they want to

24:51

be engaged with, we got to look at training,

24:54

we got to look at how we pay doctors and

24:56

we got to look at how we finance the hospital

24:58

systems that increasingly employ our

25:00

primary care doctors.

25:11

Dylan Scott, Senior Healthcare Correspondent

25:13

at Vox. His one about all this is called,

25:15

What Happened to the Family Doctor?

25:18

Find it at vox.com. Our program today was produced

25:21

by John Aarons. We were edited

25:23

by Amina Alsadi, fact

25:25

checked by Laura Bullard and mixed by

25:27

Patty Boyd. The rest of the team includes

25:29

Victoria Chamberlain, Fiona Petros,

25:32

Halima Shah, Abishai Artsy, Hadi

25:35

Mawagdi, Amanda Llewellyn, Isabel

25:37

Angel, Rob Byers, our managing editor

25:39

Matthew Koletz, our executive producer

25:42

Miranda Kennedy and our co-host Noel King.

25:45

Congratulations to Miles Bryan,

25:47

our condolences to Philadelphia. We

25:50

use music by Breakmaster Cylinder and today

25:52

we used a lot of music by John Aarons.

25:54

Today Explained is distributed by

25:56

WNYC. The show is a part of Vox.

26:00

free. Thanks in part to contributions

26:02

from our listeners. Join us at vox.com

26:05

slash give. Thank

26:07

you.