A big part of it is that nurses have been granted authority to do more procedures/prescriptions, and are now overlapping with doctors. For healthy people, a nu

A big part of it is that nurses have been granted authority to do more procedures/prescriptions, and are now overlapping with doctors. For healthy people, a nurse practitioner could probably fulfill all of your standard medical needs. You can see the effects of this in the clinics popping up inside a lot of grocery stores in the US. They have nurses on staff who can do standard procedures like flu shots, strep tests, common cold treatment etc. And to me, it seems, the outcomes are effectively the same. You get your tests, if it comes back as something known, they prescribe you meds. If not, they advise you to go to the hospital or a specialist.