Breaking down practice size: The latest data

It’s no secret that the past few decades have presented economic challenges for small, independent medical practices.

A new study puts some of those difficulties in perspective with a numerical analysis about the size of physicians’ practices.

In May, the American Medical Association (AMA) published “Physician Practice Characteristics in 2024: Private Practices Account for Less Than Half of Physicians in Most Specialties,” a new Policy Research Perspectives paper. Author Carol K. Kane, Ph.D., analyzed data from AMA’s Physician Practice Benchmark Survey.

The paper has data about how physicians’ practices are changing in size over time. There are still small practices out there, but the percentage of them is shrinking. From 2012 to 2024, there have been measurable differences in the declining number of the smallest practices, those with five or fewer doctors, and the growth of large practices with 50 or more physicians.