The Haus Research Briefing

ProfessionLens Review 2026: 1,272,256 Physicians Counted From the Federal Provider File

We reviewed ProfessionLens as a source to cite for counts of US doctors, dentists and other licensed professionals. The episode explains why its physician figure is higher than KFF, FSMB and Data USA, goes through the files it read and discarded, and lists the professions it could not count. The site was read on 20 September 2026.

  • Counts: 1,272,256 physicians, 275,976 dentists, 530,577 nurse practitioners, 328,832 pharmacists
  • Population: holders of a physician taxonomy on NPPES, with the May 2025 wage survey figure of 804,140 printed alongside
  • Funnel: 9,798,758 NPPES rows read, 2,409,308 kept, reasons stated
  • Outside check: 1,082,187 licensed physicians in the FSMB census
  • State table: 52 rows with a rate per 100,000; DC highest at 977.6
  • Not covered: attorneys, most CPAs, financial advisers; vets at 1.2% coverage

Key topics: ProfessionLens review, how many doctors are in the US, physicians by state, dentists by state, NPPES counts.

Eight sources for US doctor counts ranked: the Haus Research licensed professional count report

Reviewed: ProfessionLens

What is The Haus Research Briefing?

Audio briefings from Haus Research, a research firm. Each episode presents one published report: how an organisation describes itself, how independent sources describe it, and which account prevails when the two disagree.