Researchers at UCLA found that about 59% primary care and specialty 
physicians in California support the Affordable Care Act, and 61% believe the law will either help their practice or have no effect on it.
The survey of 525 doctors, conducted online in mid-2014, was just published in the peer-reviewed journal Family Medicine.
About 59% of the California physicians agreed with the statement that the ACA, “if fully implemented, would turn the United States in the right direction.” In 2012, only 41% of a nationwide sample physicians expressed agreement with this statement.
The authors of the latest study said this suggests that support for the ACA may increase as physicians become more knowledgeable about it.
Included in the survey were questions aimed at assessing the physicians’ understanding of the ACA. About 77% demonstrated familiarity with the basics of the law, while fewer than 6% had little understanding.
Primary care physicians were more likely to believe the ACA would improve health care and help their practice than were doctors in more specialized practice fields.
The doctors who responded to the survey had a mean age of 54; 65% were male, 68% were white, 75% were in full-time practice, and 51% were part of a group of 25 or more physicians.
The 35-question survey was distributed to 2,000 randomly selected physicians in California. A total of 559 responded, including 34 who were excluded because they were trainees, not in active practice or failed to complete the survey.
