Dear Chairman Burgess and Ranking Member Green:
On behalf of organizations dedicated to improving the health and well-being of children and
adolescents, we write to urge you to include support for loan repayment for pediatric
subspecialists as part of the effort to reauthorize the Title VII health professions workforce
programs. Support for pediatric subspecialists is a needed step toward curbing today’s
demonstrated critical shortage of pediatric medical subspecialists, pediatric surgical specialists, and
pediatric mental health specialists to help provide children with timely access to the vital health
services they need.
Currently, there is not only a shortage but also a significant disparity in the geographic distribution
of pediatric subspecialists trained to treat children in need of specialty care, resulting in many
children in underserved areas not receiving timely or appropriate health care. Children and their
families often face long waiting lists to see subspecialists or must travel long distances to find
needed care. According to a recent survey conducted by the Children’s Hospital Association,
appointment wait times for certain pediatric subspecialty care far exceed the prevailing benchmark
of two-weeks in children’s hospitals. The survey showed that the average time for a developmental
pediatric specialist is 14.5 weeks, 8.9 weeks for neurology, and 7.5 weeks for child and adolescent
psychiatry, citing just a few examples.
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