Lawmakers review residency funding, three‑way cost model and calls to expand psychiatry and family medicine slots

Committee members and analysts heard detailed briefings on Idaho's graduate medical education (GME) programs and requests to add residency slots in family medicine, internal medicine and psychiatry. Legislative analyst Kevin Campbell presented enrollment and funding data; program directors described workforce impacts.

Kevin Campbell, Legislative Services Office analyst, summarized the state's GME landscape and residency funding mechanics: many Idaho residency programs operate as three‑way partnerships among the sponsoring institution, local health systems and the state. Campbell said the state's portion of support is typically the third of program costs and that recent per‑resident costs are about $210,000 per year.

"The fund support the resident's salary, training costs, liability insurance, and payments to the doctors who oversee the resident's work," Campbell explained in the presentation of Eastern Idaho Medical Residency (EIMR). He noted EIMR had 56 residents and that the program spends nearly all appropriations each year to pay sponsoring hospitals.

Why it matters: Idaho ranks near the bottom nationally for physicians per capita; legislators repeatedly pressed that training more residents and keeping them in‑state is a long-term…