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No. 1
lowest cost of living among top metro areas |
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St. Louis is one of the nation’s leading health care centers. St. Louis is home to two renowned medical schools at Saint Louis University and Washington University. In the class of 2005-06 these schools of medicine graduated 268 MDs and 72 PhDs in Biological and Biomedical Sciences. The St. Louis MSA had 7,833 physicians in 2004, including 2,503 in primary care, 660 in subspecialties, and 3,635 in all other specialties according to the American Medical Association. These totals were 17.5% above the U.S. average number of physicians per capita and 35.6% over the average for subspecialists. In addition, the region has a dental school, college of optometry, college of chiropractic medicine, and two schools of pharmacy. Greater St. Louis also has numerous nursing, allied health, and health care technical programs. These colleges and universities along with a diverse range of local health care organizations have made St. Louis nationally known as a center for medical research, especially in the areas of medical devices and pharmaceuticals. The health care industry in the St. Louis MSA employed over 168,000 people in 2005 according to the U.S. Census Bureau. As of September 2007, the St. Louis MSA had 58 hospitals of which 45 were general acute-care hospitals. These area hospitals had over 12,500 beds authorized including approximately 7,700 medical-surgical beds. Affordable Health Insurance The St. Louis, MO-IL MSA had the least expensive health insurance premiums for family coverage out of the 20 largest metropolitan areas in the U.S. in 2005. St. Louis ranked fourth least expensive for employee-plus-one coverage and the seventh least expensive for single coverage. Data on average total premiums for private-sector establishments were collected by the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.This data documents businesses’ relatively low costs to provide health care insurance coverage to employees in Greater St. Louis. In fact, the St. Louis, MO-IL MSA had the second highest percent of overall employee health insurance enrollment (64.1%) out of the 20 largest metropolitan areas in the U.S. in 2005. The percent of the St. Louis MSA population under age 65 which was uninsured averaged 10.4% in 1999-2001, the latest data available at the metropolitan level. This was much better than the U.S. average of approximately 16% uninsured, for this population during this period according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Top Ranked Greater St. Louis’ medical schools and hospitals are consistently among the top recognized in the U.S. Click here to see St. Louis' health care ratings and rankings. Sources: |
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