Buffalo

Physician shortages, especially in primary care, have become a problem throughout the United States, as fewer medical students go into the field and older doctors retire. Primary care includes internal and family medicine, pediatrics and obstetrics-gynecology.

There were about 1,500 primary care doctors in 2015 in Western New York, about 70 percent of them in family or internal medicine, according to the University of Albany Center for Health Workforce Studies. This region had 72.2 family and internal medicine doctors per 100,000 population compared to a statewide average of 85.5.