Abstract
This Article examines the growing crisis of long primary care wait times and the health care fragmentation that is associated with them. Patients who feel ill or are worried about new symptoms must often wait weeks or longer for appointments. In the wake of excessive wait times for primary care physician (PCP) appointments, patients increasingly turn to convenience care models such as urgent care centers, retail clinics, direct-to-consumer telemedicine, and at-home testing. While these alternatives offer prompt attention, they sacrifice other core functions of primary care and may exacerbate poor health outcomes and inequities. The Article argues that long wait times and resulting care fragmentation have significant spending, quality, access, and equity implications. Furthermore, they expose health care providers to potential medical malpractice and discrimination claims. The PCP shortage, rooted in factors such as physician burnout, inadequate compensation, and insufficient residency positions, underlies the problem.
This is the first law journal article to comprehensively analyze the legal and policy implications of long PCP wait times. It recommends that policymakers and payers support strategies to improve primary care capacity and lower wait times, for example, by using artificial intelligence to facilitate administrative tasks and adopting creative scheduling policies. The Article also critiques laws and regulations that directly address appointment wait times and suggests modifications to improve their efficacy. It concludes with a brief examination of legal interventions that aim to increase the supply of PCPs and ease the financial and workload burdens that PCPs face. As the population ages and demands for care grow, addressing primary care access barriers is crucial for maintaining the health of the American population.
Keywords
Primary care access, Medicare, medical malpractice, discrimination, health care spending, health care fragmentation, urgent care, retail clinics, telemedicine, health care quality, physician shortage, artificial intelligence.
Publication Date
2026
Document Type
Article
Publication Information
University of Illinois Law Review (forthcoming 2026)
Repository Citation
Hoffman, Sharona and Ganguli, Ishani, "Access to Primary Care and Health Care Fragmentation" (2026). Faculty Publications. 2327.
https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/faculty_publications/2327