Lawmakers say they'll continue push for physician training

Some state lawmakers say they have not given up on efforts to restore money in the state budget for training medical residents at Michigan hospitals.

The Legislature dropped $9 million in medical training funds from an end-of-the-year budget bill before adjourning for the year.

But Republican state Senator Roger Kahn says he will make a renewed effort to fund the program in 2012. Kahn is a also doctor and chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee. Kahn says the funding helps keep doctors in Michigan, which faces a physician shortage.

"We’ve got to have a new generation of physicians and those physicians, when they’re trained here, have a much-higher likelihood of staying here in Michigan and becoming Michigan physicians," he said

The most recent annual survey of physicians conducted by the state Department of Community Health found 60 percent of doctors stay and practice close to the hospitals where they trained as residents.