Downturn in foreign doctors wanting to come to U.S.

There are more than 247,000 doctors with medical degrees from foreign countries practicing in the United States, making up slightly more than one-quarter of all doctors. Most foreign-trained doctors are not U.S. citizens—meaning that the majority are foreign-born.

One channel of immigration is graduate medical study. Just over 7,000 international medical graduates applied to study in the United States for 2018, down 217 from last year and nearly 400 applicants from 2016.

in 2015, nearly 25% of residents across all medical fields were born outside of the United States. In subspecialist residency programs, foreign medical graduates accounted for more than a third of residents.

Foreign-trained doctors are more likely than their U.S.-trained counterparts to practice in lower-income and disadvantaged U.S. communities. In areas with the highest poverty rates—where more than 30% of the population lives below the federal poverty rate—nearly one-third of all doctors are foreign-trained. Where per-capita income is below $15,000 per year, 42.5% of all doctors are foreign-trained. Where 75% or more of the population is non-white, 36.2% of the doctors are foreign-trained.

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