SACRAMENTO, California

A new report finds a “vast ethnic disparity in the state’s physician workforce, particularly for Latinos and African Americans,” when compared to the distribution of minority groups in the state’s population.

The study said that Latinos represented one-third of the state’s adult population, but only 5 percent of its physicians. African Americans represented 7 percent of the state’s population, but only 3 percent of physicians, it found.

The report, “Physician Diversity in California: New Findings from the California Medical Board Survey” was released April 2 by the Center for California Health Workforce Studies at the University of California, San Francisco.

In a state of more than 35 million people, the report found that about 2,000 African American and 3,000 Latino physicians were engaged in patient care in California. The report also found that while Asians as a whole were not underrepresented in medicine in California, certain Asian ethnicities were markedly underrepresented, including Samoans, Hmong/Laotians, and Cambodians.

Lack of diversity among doctors reduces access to care for patients because studies have found that physicians from minority backgrounds were more likely than their white, non-Hispanic, counterparts to work in primary-care fields and practice in underserved communities, the report noted.

The Center’s report is the first analysis of data compiled by the California Medical Board under a new law that requires it to collect data on physicians’ work hours, specialties, ethnicity, languages spoken and practice location when physician’s licenses are renewed every

two years. The California Medical Association had pressed for the legislation because it was concerned about inadequate data on the physician workforce. While the first report focuses on ethnic disparities, the Center said it plans further analysis of other issues including denial of access to care because of lack of insurance coverage and recent cuts in Medi-Cal payments to physicians.