Top news stories from AMA Morning Rounds®: Week of March 10, 2025

Read AMA Morning Rounds®’ most popular stories in medicine and public health from the week of March 10, 2025–March 14, 2025.

Forbes (3/9, Japsen) reports that the American Medical Association (AMA) and various physician groups raised concern over a recent decision by Congress to implement a 2.8% cut in Medicare payments to physicians. This decision emerged from a funding bill released over the weekend. AMA President Bruce Scott, MD, stated that the cuts are “particularly devastating for rural and underserved communities,” where “physicians and their patients have borne the brunt of the rising practice costs.” The AMA had previously supported bipartisan legislation to halt the cuts plus provide “a 2% payment update to help offset the rising costs of running a practice.” Scott said, “Despite repeated warnings, lawmakers are once again ignoring the dire consequences of these cuts and their impact both on patients and the private practices struggling to keep their doors open.”

AMA President Bruce A. Scott, MD, writes in Fierce Healthcare (3/10), “To help ensure access to care, Congress must address the lingering issues that were left on the table at the end of last year.” This includes “reversing a 2.8% cut to physician practices under the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFS) and putting guardrails around prior authorization.” But “unfortunately, the spending package Congress unveiled over the weekend continues to leave these critical issues by the wayside. This reckless decision positions doctors for a fifth consecutive year of payment cuts and continued prior authorization burdens, which will have dire consequences for both patients and physicians.” Dr. Scott argues that it is “time for lawmakers to put our health care system on a more sustainable path for patients and physicians. While ensuring fair Medicare reimbursements and streamlining prior authorization won’t solve all the problems with our health care system, they will seriously improve two major causes of widespread physician burnout and the catastrophic doctor shortage. Ultimately, this will expand patient access and help ensure Americans don’t have to wait months to see their doctor.”

Lisa Bohman Egbert, MD, speaker of the AMA House of Delegates, writes in STAT (3/11, Subscription Publication), “Like most doctors, I always felt a calling to care for people. Quitting early wasn’t my plan, but our broken health system left no other option.” She continues, “You don’t have to be a physician to know Band-Aids won’t save a critically ill patient. The combination of COVID-19 slowdowns, inflation, and a steady, two-decade decrease in pay from both Medicare and private payers made my small practice unsustainable. And I’m not alone.” Dr. Egbert argues, “There are ways we can stem this tide. Earlier this year, the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) recommended linking next year’s physician payment update to the growth in the cost of providing care. 

The AMA strongly supports tying Medicare updates to the full Medicare Economic Index, which calculates practice cost inflation.” And “when Congress receives MedPAC’s report in March, the AMA hopes lawmakers recognize a dire situation.”

Editor’s note: Medicare physician pay has declined 33% over the last 20 years. These declines are unsustainable and threaten patients’ access to physicians. How the AMA is leading the charge on reform.

Healio (3/12, Rhoades) reports a research letter suggests that “physicians often engage in electronic health record activities during their paid time off,” with most of this work occurring “near the beginning and end of vacations.” Researchers found that “physicians logged over a median 16 minutes of EHR time a day during paid time off days. Physicians also spent a median 50% of days during shorter vacation blocks with some EHR time.” The results are notable considering “previous research indicated that working 30 minutes or more daily during vacation corresponded with higher rates of burnout among physicians.” Researchers acknowledged “there is no universal solution to the challenges of separating work and PTO.” But, they said that “institutions should implement and evaluate support systems that empower physicians to have autonomy in deciding whether to engage in work tasks while away.” The research letter was published in JAMA Network Open.

You may also be interested in: Which physician specialty spends the most time in the EHR?

The Hill (3/13, Timotija) reports a Gallup survey published Thursday suggests that “Americans’ views of their mental and physical health are at the lowest point in nearly 25 years, a downturn that accelerated at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and has continued since.” According to the poll, about three-quarters of Americans rated their mental health (at 75%) and physical health (at 76%) as “excellent” or “good.” But the number of respondents “who described their mental health as ‘excellent’ shrunk to 31%. Regarding physical health, those characterizing it as ‘excellent’ went down to 24%, Gallup found.” The survey reached a low in 2022, “when the number of Americans who said their mental health rating was ‘excellent’ dropped to 31%. The lowest figure for physical health was in 2023 at 24%.”

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