The most common advice is that, if you're in good health and don't have chronic conditions to manage or acute events to handle, an annual checkup with your doctor is sufficient. The Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, which states that the goal should be prevention and maintenance of wellness, not chasing symptoms, agree with this recommendation and would add a once-a-year visit to the doctor offices of your primary care doctor, OB/GYN, and dentist and a visit every two years to your eye doctor. According to the CDC, only about 85% of US adults had a visit to a healthcare provider in 2019 while over 95% of children saw the inside of doctor offices across the country in that same year.

Age and Doctor Visits

That age has an impact on who visits doctor offices is borne out in the US census data. According to census.gov, between 2010 and 2019, adults aged 18 to 24 did not go to the doctor at all in a given year, while seniors (those 65 and older) went on average four times. The average number of visits to doctor offices begins to increase as people hit their mid 30s.

Barriers to Doctor Visits

There are, of course, many factors that can impact how many visits to doctor offices people can manage. Insurance coverage, ability to meet co-pays and deductibles, and time off from work all play a role in whether people can make it to their doctor the recommended number of times. Additionally, the availability of doctors, especially in certain areas, can impact access to doctor offices. According to statista.com, there were just over one million professionally active physicians in the United States as of March 2020, with California, New York, and Texas having the most active doctors. This is already a shortfall of about 20,000 doctors to meet the needs of an aging US population, according to estimates from the Federal Health Resources and Services Administration. But many of these doctors are specialists, leaving an even greater shortage of general practitioners.

This is why it's important to check and take advantage of your insurance coverage and schedule visits to doctor offices as early as possible. The goal is not to be overly worried about your health but to stay on top of it so that seeing your doctor can remain a once-a-year event.