• Posted June 2, 2025

Cancer Treatment 'Brain Drain' Occurring In Rural Areas

U.S. rural communities could be experiencing a “brain drain” when it comes to cancer care, a new study says.

Most new radiation oncologists — docs who treat cancer with radiation — are choosing to work in big metropolitan areas rather than in rural locales, researchers found.

Only a little more than 4% of new radiation oncologists accepted their first jobs in rural counties, and most were in areas located near cities, researchers reported recently in the International Journal of Radiation Oncology: Biology, Physics.

“Cancer affects people everywhere, not just in big cities,” said senior researcher Dr. Kunal Sindhu, an assistant professor of radiation oncology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City.

“We need to make sure that patients in rural areas can get high-quality care without having to travel long distances,” Sindhu added in a news release.

For the study, researchers analyzed data on nearly 1,400 new U.S. radiation oncology residents who graduated between 2015 and 2022.

“Just 60 residents (4.3%) accepted first jobs in nonmetro counties,” researchers wrote in their report.

By comparison, nearly 14% of the U.S. population lives in rural areas, researchers noted.

Results showed that new doctors were more likely to work in counties that had higher populations, wealthier households, more hospitals and more primary care doctors.

Of those who chose to work in a rural area, only 40% settled in a county that was nowhere near a major metropolitan area, researchers found.

“It is known that patients living in more rural areas of the United States face significant obstacles in obtaining radiation oncology services and often suffer inferior cancer outcomes,” researchers wrote.

These patients have to travel longer for treatment, experience treatment delays and have fewer options for their care, researchers said.

“Our results suggest that geographic disparities in radiation oncology accessibility for non-metro counties may persist into the future,” they concluded.

The researchers next plan to study those radiation oncologists who did choose jobs in rural areas, to learn more about what might encourage other docs to do the same.

More information

The U.S. Government Accountability Office has more on health care access in rural areas.

SOURCES: Mount Sinai, news release, May 27, 2025; International Journal of Radiation Oncology: Biology, Physics, May 17, 2025