o who is performing your annual clinical breast exam these days? If your reply was that you depend on your primary care physician (PCP) or gynecologist, it’s possible that your answer is going to have to change sometime in the future.

Our aging docs

Why? Because nearly half of the nation’s 830,000 physicians are over age 50 and are already struggling to keep up with the demands of seeing more patients than ever before. This will worsen as we prepare for (did I say “prepare”? I probably should have said, “Sit around and watch”) the influx of millions more people currently without insurance who will flood the medical arena in the very near future.

So what is the solution?

There may be several. First, make sure that you are doing your own monthly breast self-exams. Let’s face it; you no doubt know the geography of your own breasts better than anyone else does, including your doctor, who used to see you annually.

Second, see if there is a nurse practitioner in your area who is going to start, or has already embarked on, serving as a primary care provider or gynecological care provider. NPs do a great job and will be needed now more than ever before.

So long, PCP; hello, my new NP!

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