Shaun Frost, MD, SFHM

In my last column, I outlined the “accountability imperative” facing the specialty of hospital medicine, and I discussed the need to hold ourselves accountable for delivering true, high-value healthcare. However, this is easier said than done; being accountable in the complex environments in which we work is difficult. The key to simplifying accountability rests in deconstructing the concept in a manner that allows us to consistently appeal to its fundamental tenets, so that applying these tenets in our everyday lives is easy. Understanding accountability begins with defining the term.

Accountability Defined

To be truly accountable, one must first appreciate what accountability is, and what it is not. This is beautifully articulated in a well-written book by Connors, Smith, and Hickman titled “The Oz Principle: Getting Results Through Individual and Organizational Accountability.”¹ Connors and colleagues advise that we must conceive of accountability as forward-looking versus backward-looking judgment. All too often, society thinks of accountability as a historical or retrospective concept, that accountability is something to invoke when an individual has failed to meet expectations. Defining accountability in this manner casts the concept in a negative light by invoking fear and anxiety; accountability becomes synonymous with punishment, retribution, blame, humiliation, and scrutiny.

“The Oz Principle” suggests that “accountability is more than a confession,” and warns that people who narrowly define accountability in this manner become “obsessed with the past, and blissfully ignorant of the future.” This is sage advice for the profession of medicine. All too often, clinicians and healthcare professionals yearn for a past era in which it was supposedly easier to practice medicine because of independence from rules, regulations, protocols, pathways, performance measurement, and performance reporting. In lamenting the loss of a past era, people risk ignoring the present and thus fail to embrace healthcare reform initiatives that will soon establish new expectations. These new expectations must be met to ensure future success.

It behooves us─hospitalists─to define accountability in a more constructive and future-oriented manner. To this end, Connors and colleagues propose that accountability be conceived of as “a personal choice to rise above one’s circumstances and demonstrate ownership necessary for achieving results.” Such a definition empowers us to anticipate the future by acting proactively to avoid problems, rather than reactively, which forces us to explain why problems occurred. In so doing, we embrace our current situation, actively seek to understand new initiatives compelling us to alter our behavior, recognize the dangers in maintaining outdated status quos, and become actively engaged participants in obligatory change initiatives.

If this is our perspective, genuine, patient-centered care will become the norm, and we will avoid the temptation to dismiss problems as beyond the scope of our responsibility or control. If rising above our circumstances is the motivation, we will not blame poor patient satisfaction survey results on bad hospital food, avoidable hospital readmissions on unavailable post-discharge follow-up appointments, and unnecessary testing on the risk of malpractice litigation.

Furthermore, we must appreciate that our spheres of responsibility overlap those of others in healthcare. As such, success in meeting our expectations directly influences the ability of others to successfully meet theirs, which directly affects our collective ability to achieve healthcare improvement goals. For example, if hospitalists do not effectively communicate patient-care-plan information to nurses, nurses will not be best prepared to respond to patient questions, and patients will potentially be dissatisfied with their hospital experience. In such circumstances, it would be unfair for the hospitalist to blame poor patient satisfaction scores on nursing, because patient dissatisfaction could have been avoided had the hospitalist been accountable for sufficient communication of care-planning information.

Examples such as this turn the spotlight on healthcare professionals. We are jointly accountable for the delivery of high-value healthcare, and are interdependent on each other in this regard. According to “The Oz Principle,” “when people view their accountability for results as something larger than doing their own jobs, they find themselves feeling accountable for things beyond what a literal interpretation of their job description may suggest.”

Don’t Be a Victim

The key to maintaining a future-oriented and proactive view of accountability (pushing us to consistently rise above our circumstances) is to not fall trap to becoming a victim. Connors and colleagues caution that when confronted with poor results and suboptimal performance, there is a natural temptation to make excuses, point fingers at others, create arguments for why we are not to blame, and otherwise rationalize why we are not accountable. Unfortunately, this attitude only perpetuates the myopically negative view of accountability “as a confession,” to be invoked to scrutinize, blame, or punish. A victimization mentality leads to the creation of cultures in which “saving face” is more important than solving problems, and, according to “The Oz Principle,” “quick fixes are favored over long-term solutions, immediate gains are favored over enduring progress, and process is favored over results.”

The danger of favoring process over results seems particularly germane to healthcare quality improvement (QI). In the complex, fast-moving, and pressurized environment of the hospital, it is easy to become satisfied with creating and deploying processes to address such issues as glycemic control, VTE prevention, or safe transitions of care. These processes are surely necessary, but they are certainly not sufficient.

Results are what we are aiming to achieve—not processes. In order to achieve results, the process must be actively managed, and the participants engaged in the processes must hold themselves─and each other─accountable for achieving the results that the processes are designed to effect.

Connors and colleagues write that “accountability for results rests at the very core of continuous improvement....The essence of these programs boils down to getting people to rise above their circumstances to do whatever it takes to get the results they want.” In order for HM to rise above current healthcare circumstances, we must never play the victim role. Blaming others will only keep us mired in current dysfunctional situations, preventing us from breaking free of untenable status quos that prohibit the delivery of high-quality and cost-effective patient care.

Conclusion

Accountability is difficult, especially for hospitalists. The time, though, is now for each of us to embrace accountability, because we will be expected to perform at increasingly higher levels of sophistication in the future. The first step to embracing accountability is to understand the concept, and in my next column, I will further describe concepts that demystify accountability by making it easier to apply in our everyday experiences.

Dr. Frost is president of SHM.

Reference

1. Connors R, Smith T, Hickman C. “The Oz Principle: Getting Results Through Individual and Organizational Accountability.” New York: Portfolio; 2004.

Shaun Frost, MD, SFHM

In my last column, I outlined the “accountability imperative” facing the specialty of hospital medicine, and I discussed the need to hold ourselves accountable for delivering true, high-value healthcare. However, this is easier said than done; being accountable in the complex environments in which we work is difficult. The key to simplifying accountability rests in deconstructing the concept in a manner that allows us to consistently appeal to its fundamental tenets, so that applying these tenets in our everyday lives is easy. Understanding accountability begins with defining the term.

Accountability Defined

To be truly accountable, one must first appreciate what accountability is, and what it is not. This is beautifully articulated in a well-written book by Connors, Smith, and Hickman titled “The Oz Principle: Getting Results Through Individual and Organizational Accountability.”¹ Connors and colleagues advise that we must conceive of accountability as forward-looking versus backward-looking judgment. All too often, society thinks of accountability as a historical or retrospective concept, that accountability is something to invoke when an individual has failed to meet expectations. Defining accountability in this manner casts the concept in a negative light by invoking fear and anxiety; accountability becomes synonymous with punishment, retribution, blame, humiliation, and scrutiny.

“The Oz Principle” suggests that “accountability is more than a confession,” and warns that people who narrowly define accountability in this manner become “obsessed with the past, and blissfully ignorant of the future.” This is sage advice for the profession of medicine. All too often, clinicians and healthcare professionals yearn for a past era in which it was supposedly easier to practice medicine because of independence from rules, regulations, protocols, pathways, performance measurement, and performance reporting. In lamenting the loss of a past era, people risk ignoring the present and thus fail to embrace healthcare reform initiatives that will soon establish new expectations. These new expectations must be met to ensure future success.

It behooves us─hospitalists─to define accountability in a more constructive and future-oriented manner. To this end, Connors and colleagues propose that accountability be conceived of as “a personal choice to rise above one’s circumstances and demonstrate ownership necessary for achieving results.” Such a definition empowers us to anticipate the future by acting proactively to avoid problems, rather than reactively, which forces us to explain why problems occurred. In so doing, we embrace our current situation, actively seek to understand new initiatives compelling us to alter our behavior, recognize the dangers in maintaining outdated status quos, and become actively engaged participants in obligatory change initiatives.

If this is our perspective, genuine, patient-centered care will become the norm, and we will avoid the temptation to dismiss problems as beyond the scope of our responsibility or control. If rising above our circumstances is the motivation, we will not blame poor patient satisfaction survey results on bad hospital food, avoidable hospital readmissions on unavailable post-discharge follow-up appointments, and unnecessary testing on the risk of malpractice litigation.

Furthermore, we must appreciate that our spheres of responsibility overlap those of others in healthcare. As such, success in meeting our expectations directly influences the ability of others to successfully meet theirs, which directly affects our collective ability to achieve healthcare improvement goals. For example, if hospitalists do not effectively communicate patient-care-plan information to nurses, nurses will not be best prepared to respond to patient questions, and patients will potentially be dissatisfied with their hospital experience. In such circumstances, it would be unfair for the hospitalist to blame poor patient satisfaction scores on nursing, because patient dissatisfaction could have been avoided had the hospitalist been accountable for sufficient communication of care-planning information.

Examples such as this turn the spotlight on healthcare professionals. We are jointly accountable for the delivery of high-value healthcare, and are interdependent on each other in this regard. According to “The Oz Principle,” “when people view their accountability for results as something larger than doing their own jobs, they find themselves feeling accountable for things beyond what a literal interpretation of their job description may suggest.”

Don’t Be a Victim

The key to maintaining a future-oriented and proactive view of accountability (pushing us to consistently rise above our circumstances) is to not fall trap to becoming a victim. Connors and colleagues caution that when confronted with poor results and suboptimal performance, there is a natural temptation to make excuses, point fingers at others, create arguments for why we are not to blame, and otherwise rationalize why we are not accountable. Unfortunately, this attitude only perpetuates the myopically negative view of accountability “as a confession,” to be invoked to scrutinize, blame, or punish. A victimization mentality leads to the creation of cultures in which “saving face” is more important than solving problems, and, according to “The Oz Principle,” “quick fixes are favored over long-term solutions, immediate gains are favored over enduring progress, and process is favored over results.”

The danger of favoring process over results seems particularly germane to healthcare quality improvement (QI). In the complex, fast-moving, and pressurized environment of the hospital, it is easy to become satisfied with creating and deploying processes to address such issues as glycemic control, VTE prevention, or safe transitions of care. These processes are surely necessary, but they are certainly not sufficient.

Results are what we are aiming to achieve—not processes. In order to achieve results, the process must be actively managed, and the participants engaged in the processes must hold themselves─and each other─accountable for achieving the results that the processes are designed to effect.

Connors and colleagues write that “accountability for results rests at the very core of continuous improvement....The essence of these programs boils down to getting people to rise above their circumstances to do whatever it takes to get the results they want.” In order for HM to rise above current healthcare circumstances, we must never play the victim role. Blaming others will only keep us mired in current dysfunctional situations, preventing us from breaking free of untenable status quos that prohibit the delivery of high-quality and cost-effective patient care.

Conclusion

Accountability is difficult, especially for hospitalists. The time, though, is now for each of us to embrace accountability, because we will be expected to perform at increasingly higher levels of sophistication in the future. The first step to embracing accountability is to understand the concept, and in my next column, I will further describe concepts that demystify accountability by making it easier to apply in our everyday experiences.

Dr. Frost is president of SHM.

Reference

1. Connors R, Smith T, Hickman C. “The Oz Principle: Getting Results Through Individual and Organizational Accountability.” New York: Portfolio; 2004.

Shaun Frost, MD, SFHM

In my last column, I outlined the “accountability imperative” facing the specialty of hospital medicine, and I discussed the need to hold ourselves accountable for delivering true, high-value healthcare. However, this is easier said than done; being accountable in the complex environments in which we work is difficult. The key to simplifying accountability rests in deconstructing the concept in a manner that allows us to consistently appeal to its fundamental tenets, so that applying these tenets in our everyday lives is easy. Understanding accountability begins with defining the term.

Accountability Defined

To be truly accountable, one must first appreciate what accountability is, and what it is not. This is beautifully articulated in a well-written book by Connors, Smith, and Hickman titled “The Oz Principle: Getting Results Through Individual and Organizational Accountability.”¹ Connors and colleagues advise that we must conceive of accountability as forward-looking versus backward-looking judgment. All too often, society thinks of accountability as a historical or retrospective concept, that accountability is something to invoke when an individual has failed to meet expectations. Defining accountability in this manner casts the concept in a negative light by invoking fear and anxiety; accountability becomes synonymous with punishment, retribution, blame, humiliation, and scrutiny.

“The Oz Principle” suggests that “accountability is more than a confession,” and warns that people who narrowly define accountability in this manner become “obsessed with the past, and blissfully ignorant of the future.” This is sage advice for the profession of medicine. All too often, clinicians and healthcare professionals yearn for a past era in which it was supposedly easier to practice medicine because of independence from rules, regulations, protocols, pathways, performance measurement, and performance reporting. In lamenting the loss of a past era, people risk ignoring the present and thus fail to embrace healthcare reform initiatives that will soon establish new expectations. These new expectations must be met to ensure future success.

It behooves us─hospitalists─to define accountability in a more constructive and future-oriented manner. To this end, Connors and colleagues propose that accountability be conceived of as “a personal choice to rise above one’s circumstances and demonstrate ownership necessary for achieving results.” Such a definition empowers us to anticipate the future by acting proactively to avoid problems, rather than reactively, which forces us to explain why problems occurred. In so doing, we embrace our current situation, actively seek to understand new initiatives compelling us to alter our behavior, recognize the dangers in maintaining outdated status quos, and become actively engaged participants in obligatory change initiatives.

If this is our perspective, genuine, patient-centered care will become the norm, and we will avoid the temptation to dismiss problems as beyond the scope of our responsibility or control. If rising above our circumstances is the motivation, we will not blame poor patient satisfaction survey results on bad hospital food, avoidable hospital readmissions on unavailable post-discharge follow-up appointments, and unnecessary testing on the risk of malpractice litigation.

Furthermore, we must appreciate that our spheres of responsibility overlap those of others in healthcare. As such, success in meeting our expectations directly influences the ability of others to successfully meet theirs, which directly affects our collective ability to achieve healthcare improvement goals. For example, if hospitalists do not effectively communicate patient-care-plan information to nurses, nurses will not be best prepared to respond to patient questions, and patients will potentially be dissatisfied with their hospital experience. In such circumstances, it would be unfair for the hospitalist to blame poor patient satisfaction scores on nursing, because patient dissatisfaction could have been avoided had the hospitalist been accountable for sufficient communication of care-planning information.

Examples such as this turn the spotlight on healthcare professionals. We are jointly accountable for the delivery of high-value healthcare, and are interdependent on each other in this regard. According to “The Oz Principle,” “when people view their accountability for results as something larger than doing their own jobs, they find themselves feeling accountable for things beyond what a literal interpretation of their job description may suggest.”

Don’t Be a Victim

The key to maintaining a future-oriented and proactive view of accountability (pushing us to consistently rise above our circumstances) is to not fall trap to becoming a victim. Connors and colleagues caution that when confronted with poor results and suboptimal performance, there is a natural temptation to make excuses, point fingers at others, create arguments for why we are not to blame, and otherwise rationalize why we are not accountable. Unfortunately, this attitude only perpetuates the myopically negative view of accountability “as a confession,” to be invoked to scrutinize, blame, or punish. A victimization mentality leads to the creation of cultures in which “saving face” is more important than solving problems, and, according to “The Oz Principle,” “quick fixes are favored over long-term solutions, immediate gains are favored over enduring progress, and process is favored over results.”

The danger of favoring process over results seems particularly germane to healthcare quality improvement (QI). In the complex, fast-moving, and pressurized environment of the hospital, it is easy to become satisfied with creating and deploying processes to address such issues as glycemic control, VTE prevention, or safe transitions of care. These processes are surely necessary, but they are certainly not sufficient.

Results are what we are aiming to achieve—not processes. In order to achieve results, the process must be actively managed, and the participants engaged in the processes must hold themselves─and each other─accountable for achieving the results that the processes are designed to effect.

Connors and colleagues write that “accountability for results rests at the very core of continuous improvement....The essence of these programs boils down to getting people to rise above their circumstances to do whatever it takes to get the results they want.” In order for HM to rise above current healthcare circumstances, we must never play the victim role. Blaming others will only keep us mired in current dysfunctional situations, preventing us from breaking free of untenable status quos that prohibit the delivery of high-quality and cost-effective patient care.

Conclusion

Accountability is difficult, especially for hospitalists. The time, though, is now for each of us to embrace accountability, because we will be expected to perform at increasingly higher levels of sophistication in the future. The first step to embracing accountability is to understand the concept, and in my next column, I will further describe concepts that demystify accountability by making it easier to apply in our everyday experiences.

Dr. Frost is president of SHM.

Reference

1. Connors R, Smith T, Hickman C. “The Oz Principle: Getting Results Through Individual and Organizational Accountability.” New York: Portfolio; 2004.

Danielle Scheurer, MD, MSCR, SFHM

Let’s be honest. How many times in the past (insert any timeline here; month, week, day, minute) have you heard a disparaging comment about a hospital regulatory agency? They usually sound something like, “Well, I’ll be darned if I am going to let CMS tell me how to practice medicine” or “So is this another Joint Commission thing?”

I understand the frustration. The healthcare industry is incredibly regulated. So much so that I, and countless others in hospital administration offices around the country, relinquish an inordinate amount of time figuring out what it is we are supposed to be complying with, then figuring how we are actually going to do it. It often has been equated to Whac-a-Mole, a game that requires more eyeballs and arm strength than an extraterrestrial possesses. There are many reasons that underlie the frustration and lead to the disparaging comments:

• Some requirements are not perfectly evidence-based. Not all process measures actually correlate with any outcomes; just because someone checks an oxygen saturation on every pneumonia patient doesn’t mean anything else improves for the patient.
• Some requirements are poorly implemented. I think we can all agree that counseling patients to stop smoking is a laudable goal. However, “smoking cessation counseling” is often relegated to uttering a short phrase (“you know you should really quit smoking”) while holding the exit-door handle, then checking the box for documentation. This “counseling session” is probably as effective as declaring every day a Great American Smokeout.
• Some regulations result in unintended consequences when implemented into large, complicated organizations. An obvious example is the time to first antibiotic in pneumonia patients, which resulted in frequent and unnecessary antibiotic utilization in patients who did not have pneumonia.
• Some are just extremely difficult to accomplish with high reliability. An example here is time to PCI for heart attacks. It’s clearly the right thing to do, and clearly very difficult to get it completed, on time, on every single patient. And 99% compliance is just not good enough, because the 1% matters.

And as a result of these imperfections, “noncompliance” leads to lots of emails, rework, restructuring, and at times downright bickering—hence, the disparaging comments.

Regulatory Origins and Missions

But let’s back up for a minute and think about why healthcare regulations exist: Many local, state, and federal agencies have enhanced the scrutiny of healthcare over time because, quite frankly, the healthcare industry did not regulate itself very well. We insisted for decades that patients were each too unique to be “cook-booked,” that medicine was an art as much as it was a science, and that “it’s just complicated.”

It took a few (too many) high-profile deaths and a few common-sense publications to incense the public, our payors, and our regulators. Who is not familiar with the 98,000-preventable-deaths-a-year statistic? Not only is that figure sobering, but it also is quite difficult to untether from our reputation. Henceforth, over the course of decades, a multitude of moles have emerged, littering the landscape and sparing no area of the healthcare industry.

So let’s back up another minute and think about what these agencies are trying to do: Could it be that most regulatory agencies really do want to leverage large-scale improvements in patient outcomes, at the best value?

Take this vision statement, as an example: “All people always experience the safest, highest-quality, best-value healthcare across all settings.”

Sounds like the kind of healthcare I want for my kids and my mom. That is the vision statement of the Joint Commission.

How about this vision statement: “CMS is a major force and a trustworthy partner for the continual improvement of health and healthcare for all Americans.”

Not too shabby.

So why do we view regulators like moles? Why do we arm ourselves with big, black mallets ready to strike when we see them emerge from the corner of our eye?

HM-Mole Alliance

Whac-a-Mole is an unwinnable game. No player has ever whacked all the moles. If you have not been to your local arcade lately, the game starts out slow, such that most players can keep pace; it then accelerates, such that several moles are outside the holes simultaneously, and their time above ground becomes consecutively shorter. You can add mallets, even add players, but generally they end up getting in each other’s way, communication breaks down, and one mole gets whacked twice, while another exits unscathed, only to break the soil elsewhere.

Danielle Scheurer, MD, MSCR, SFHM

Maybe a better strategy is to have a strategy—to work with our “trustworthy partners” to align our vision statements, anticipate the vermin’s approach, and fill the holes (or chasms) before anything has a chance to squeeze through. Maybe we should tell them where the moles are, because we actually already know what they look like and where they dwell. Why don’t we tell them which moles are the most dangerous, the most annoying, or are the most likely to tear up the topsoil into an irreparable state?

What about all the issues that no one is telling us we have to comply with—for example, a universal allergy list across the spectrum of care, or a perfectly reliable system to ensure that a patient with an epidural catheter cannot be anticoagulated? Such a list is endless, and no one is telling us we have to address the majority of the items on the list.

It comes down to this: What kind of healthcare do you want for yourself, your family, and the patients who trust you? I’d rather not have a reactive, frantic race to obliterate the next torrid creature that has arisen. I suggest a proactive, strategic pathway of tilling the soil.

In anticipation of a universal vote for the latter, join me in congratulating the healthcare industry in holding ourselves accountable, embracing a new era of transparency and collaboration, and routinely going beyond the expectations of our regulators. And leaving the mallet in the arcade.

Dr. Scheurer is a hospitalist and chief quality officer at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston. She is physician editor of The Hospitalist. Email her at [email protected].

Danielle Scheurer, MD, MSCR, SFHM

Let’s be honest. How many times in the past (insert any timeline here; month, week, day, minute) have you heard a disparaging comment about a hospital regulatory agency? They usually sound something like, “Well, I’ll be darned if I am going to let CMS tell me how to practice medicine” or “So is this another Joint Commission thing?”

I understand the frustration. The healthcare industry is incredibly regulated. So much so that I, and countless others in hospital administration offices around the country, relinquish an inordinate amount of time figuring out what it is we are supposed to be complying with, then figuring how we are actually going to do it. It often has been equated to Whac-a-Mole, a game that requires more eyeballs and arm strength than an extraterrestrial possesses. There are many reasons that underlie the frustration and lead to the disparaging comments:

• Some requirements are not perfectly evidence-based. Not all process measures actually correlate with any outcomes; just because someone checks an oxygen saturation on every pneumonia patient doesn’t mean anything else improves for the patient.
• Some requirements are poorly implemented. I think we can all agree that counseling patients to stop smoking is a laudable goal. However, “smoking cessation counseling” is often relegated to uttering a short phrase (“you know you should really quit smoking”) while holding the exit-door handle, then checking the box for documentation. This “counseling session” is probably as effective as declaring every day a Great American Smokeout.
• Some regulations result in unintended consequences when implemented into large, complicated organizations. An obvious example is the time to first antibiotic in pneumonia patients, which resulted in frequent and unnecessary antibiotic utilization in patients who did not have pneumonia.
• Some are just extremely difficult to accomplish with high reliability. An example here is time to PCI for heart attacks. It’s clearly the right thing to do, and clearly very difficult to get it completed, on time, on every single patient. And 99% compliance is just not good enough, because the 1% matters.

And as a result of these imperfections, “noncompliance” leads to lots of emails, rework, restructuring, and at times downright bickering—hence, the disparaging comments.

Regulatory Origins and Missions

But let’s back up for a minute and think about why healthcare regulations exist: Many local, state, and federal agencies have enhanced the scrutiny of healthcare over time because, quite frankly, the healthcare industry did not regulate itself very well. We insisted for decades that patients were each too unique to be “cook-booked,” that medicine was an art as much as it was a science, and that “it’s just complicated.”

It took a few (too many) high-profile deaths and a few common-sense publications to incense the public, our payors, and our regulators. Who is not familiar with the 98,000-preventable-deaths-a-year statistic? Not only is that figure sobering, but it also is quite difficult to untether from our reputation. Henceforth, over the course of decades, a multitude of moles have emerged, littering the landscape and sparing no area of the healthcare industry.

So let’s back up another minute and think about what these agencies are trying to do: Could it be that most regulatory agencies really do want to leverage large-scale improvements in patient outcomes, at the best value?

Take this vision statement, as an example: “All people always experience the safest, highest-quality, best-value healthcare across all settings.”

Sounds like the kind of healthcare I want for my kids and my mom. That is the vision statement of the Joint Commission.

How about this vision statement: “CMS is a major force and a trustworthy partner for the continual improvement of health and healthcare for all Americans.”

Not too shabby.

So why do we view regulators like moles? Why do we arm ourselves with big, black mallets ready to strike when we see them emerge from the corner of our eye?

HM-Mole Alliance

Whac-a-Mole is an unwinnable game. No player has ever whacked all the moles. If you have not been to your local arcade lately, the game starts out slow, such that most players can keep pace; it then accelerates, such that several moles are outside the holes simultaneously, and their time above ground becomes consecutively shorter. You can add mallets, even add players, but generally they end up getting in each other’s way, communication breaks down, and one mole gets whacked twice, while another exits unscathed, only to break the soil elsewhere.

Danielle Scheurer, MD, MSCR, SFHM

Maybe a better strategy is to have a strategy—to work with our “trustworthy partners” to align our vision statements, anticipate the vermin’s approach, and fill the holes (or chasms) before anything has a chance to squeeze through. Maybe we should tell them where the moles are, because we actually already know what they look like and where they dwell. Why don’t we tell them which moles are the most dangerous, the most annoying, or are the most likely to tear up the topsoil into an irreparable state?

What about all the issues that no one is telling us we have to comply with—for example, a universal allergy list across the spectrum of care, or a perfectly reliable system to ensure that a patient with an epidural catheter cannot be anticoagulated? Such a list is endless, and no one is telling us we have to address the majority of the items on the list.

It comes down to this: What kind of healthcare do you want for yourself, your family, and the patients who trust you? I’d rather not have a reactive, frantic race to obliterate the next torrid creature that has arisen. I suggest a proactive, strategic pathway of tilling the soil.

In anticipation of a universal vote for the latter, join me in congratulating the healthcare industry in holding ourselves accountable, embracing a new era of transparency and collaboration, and routinely going beyond the expectations of our regulators. And leaving the mallet in the arcade.

Dr. Scheurer is a hospitalist and chief quality officer at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston. She is physician editor of The Hospitalist. Email her at [email protected].

Danielle Scheurer, MD, MSCR, SFHM

Let’s be honest. How many times in the past (insert any timeline here; month, week, day, minute) have you heard a disparaging comment about a hospital regulatory agency? They usually sound something like, “Well, I’ll be darned if I am going to let CMS tell me how to practice medicine” or “So is this another Joint Commission thing?”

I understand the frustration. The healthcare industry is incredibly regulated. So much so that I, and countless others in hospital administration offices around the country, relinquish an inordinate amount of time figuring out what it is we are supposed to be complying with, then figuring how we are actually going to do it. It often has been equated to Whac-a-Mole, a game that requires more eyeballs and arm strength than an extraterrestrial possesses. There are many reasons that underlie the frustration and lead to the disparaging comments:

• Some requirements are not perfectly evidence-based. Not all process measures actually correlate with any outcomes; just because someone checks an oxygen saturation on every pneumonia patient doesn’t mean anything else improves for the patient.
• Some requirements are poorly implemented. I think we can all agree that counseling patients to stop smoking is a laudable goal. However, “smoking cessation counseling” is often relegated to uttering a short phrase (“you know you should really quit smoking”) while holding the exit-door handle, then checking the box for documentation. This “counseling session” is probably as effective as declaring every day a Great American Smokeout.
• Some regulations result in unintended consequences when implemented into large, complicated organizations. An obvious example is the time to first antibiotic in pneumonia patients, which resulted in frequent and unnecessary antibiotic utilization in patients who did not have pneumonia.
• Some are just extremely difficult to accomplish with high reliability. An example here is time to PCI for heart attacks. It’s clearly the right thing to do, and clearly very difficult to get it completed, on time, on every single patient. And 99% compliance is just not good enough, because the 1% matters.

And as a result of these imperfections, “noncompliance” leads to lots of emails, rework, restructuring, and at times downright bickering—hence, the disparaging comments.

Regulatory Origins and Missions

But let’s back up for a minute and think about why healthcare regulations exist: Many local, state, and federal agencies have enhanced the scrutiny of healthcare over time because, quite frankly, the healthcare industry did not regulate itself very well. We insisted for decades that patients were each too unique to be “cook-booked,” that medicine was an art as much as it was a science, and that “it’s just complicated.”

It took a few (too many) high-profile deaths and a few common-sense publications to incense the public, our payors, and our regulators. Who is not familiar with the 98,000-preventable-deaths-a-year statistic? Not only is that figure sobering, but it also is quite difficult to untether from our reputation. Henceforth, over the course of decades, a multitude of moles have emerged, littering the landscape and sparing no area of the healthcare industry.

So let’s back up another minute and think about what these agencies are trying to do: Could it be that most regulatory agencies really do want to leverage large-scale improvements in patient outcomes, at the best value?

Take this vision statement, as an example: “All people always experience the safest, highest-quality, best-value healthcare across all settings.”

Sounds like the kind of healthcare I want for my kids and my mom. That is the vision statement of the Joint Commission.

How about this vision statement: “CMS is a major force and a trustworthy partner for the continual improvement of health and healthcare for all Americans.”

Not too shabby.

So why do we view regulators like moles? Why do we arm ourselves with big, black mallets ready to strike when we see them emerge from the corner of our eye?

HM-Mole Alliance

Whac-a-Mole is an unwinnable game. No player has ever whacked all the moles. If you have not been to your local arcade lately, the game starts out slow, such that most players can keep pace; it then accelerates, such that several moles are outside the holes simultaneously, and their time above ground becomes consecutively shorter. You can add mallets, even add players, but generally they end up getting in each other’s way, communication breaks down, and one mole gets whacked twice, while another exits unscathed, only to break the soil elsewhere.

Danielle Scheurer, MD, MSCR, SFHM

Maybe a better strategy is to have a strategy—to work with our “trustworthy partners” to align our vision statements, anticipate the vermin’s approach, and fill the holes (or chasms) before anything has a chance to squeeze through. Maybe we should tell them where the moles are, because we actually already know what they look like and where they dwell. Why don’t we tell them which moles are the most dangerous, the most annoying, or are the most likely to tear up the topsoil into an irreparable state?

What about all the issues that no one is telling us we have to comply with—for example, a universal allergy list across the spectrum of care, or a perfectly reliable system to ensure that a patient with an epidural catheter cannot be anticoagulated? Such a list is endless, and no one is telling us we have to address the majority of the items on the list.

It comes down to this: What kind of healthcare do you want for yourself, your family, and the patients who trust you? I’d rather not have a reactive, frantic race to obliterate the next torrid creature that has arisen. I suggest a proactive, strategic pathway of tilling the soil.

In anticipation of a universal vote for the latter, join me in congratulating the healthcare industry in holding ourselves accountable, embracing a new era of transparency and collaboration, and routinely going beyond the expectations of our regulators. And leaving the mallet in the arcade.

Dr. Scheurer is a hospitalist and chief quality officer at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston. She is physician editor of The Hospitalist. Email her at [email protected].

John Nelson, MD, MHM

Editor’s note: First of a two-part series.

Think about the last time you found yourself in the middle of a contentious conversation with another doctor about whether a patient should be admitted by you, the hospitalist, or by a doctor in another specialty. Such conversations can sometimes move quickly from respectful disagreement to posturing, drawing lines in the sand, or worse.

Respectful conversations between doctors with differing opinions about the best plan of care for patients are valuable. But disagreements that lead doctors to talk at rather than with each other risk creating quality-of-care issues for the patient, demoralize other hospital staff, and can result in lasting harm to the relationship between the doctors involved. I’d bet the frequency of such disputes could serve as a reliable predictor of overall quality of care, and might correlate with cost of care. Doctors in all specialties should work diligently to reduce the chance that such conversations lead to conflict and stress.

Middle Manager

This conflict arises most often when an ED doctor is calling about a patient needing admission; the way communication between ED doctors and other physicians happens nearly everywhere is one reason the problem is so difficult to eradicate. (To be clear, I’m not faulting ED doctors for causing this problem; I think they usually try very hard to prevent it.)

Because the ED doctor is often in the middle of the chain of communication (disagreement), those whom the ED doctor is asking to admit the patient often are emboldened to take more unreasonable or extreme positions. It is a lot easier for Dr. Perry to make a case to the ED doctors that Dr. Mercury should admit a patient than to present the same rationale to Dr. Mercury himself. In many cases, the ED doctors can make the problem go away, or at least extricate themselves from the disagreement, by insisting that Dr. Perry and Dr. Mercury speak directly to each other.

Of course, things can sometimes go so badly that they refuse to speak directly with one another and force the ED doctor to settle the dispute a power given to the ED doctor by the medical staff bylaws at nearly every hospital. Or maybe they do speak directly and that leads to greater conflict (i.e. shouting or an abrupt hang-up).

Improved Social Connections

Most hospitals I’ve worked with seem to feature harmonious and collegial relationships between the ED doctors, hospitalists, and other specialties. But for some, divisive conflict crops up frequently. A first step for those hospitals laden with conflict could be to deliberately work to improve the social connections between the physician groups that often disagree. I’m not Pollyannaish; sometimes relationships are beyond repair, or one of the doctors involved might have a character disorder that requires more significant interventions.

A few years ago, I visited a place where years of conflict between ED doctors and hospitalists had led to remarkably adversarial relationships. Both of the lead physicians for the ED doctors and hospitalists were pleasant, professional, and highly regarded by others. Nonetheless, they both were fed up with the ongoing conflict and found themselves in such an adversarial relationship that I worried the next nighttime dispute could come to blows (literally). With a combination of support and pressure from hospital leaders and physician peers, they committed to a series of dinner meetings, just the two of them. They agreed to meet monthly, away from the hospital, and for the first few meetings avoid any conversation about work-related issues. The point was for them to build social connections so that they could find new ways of communicating, thus regain respect for the character of the other.

Some months later, I heard from the lead hospitalist, who said that the meetings had proven very valuable and things had improved dramatically between the department heads. He also said they were working together to improve the way their whole groups interacted. This wouldn’t work so well everywhere, and would have failed if not for the good character of both the doctors. But I’m struck by how infrequently the formation of social ties is included in any plan to reduce physician conflict. It is valuable, regardless of which specialties the doctors work in.

Hospitals have figured this out. Most provide a doctor’s lounge where meals might be served to provide a place for socialization. Some arrange periodic retreats for physician and hospital leaders to spend a weekend in a nice setting (with some time devoted to business and ample time for recreation and socialization). Expensive “perks” like these probably pay dividends in improving culture and reducing conflict. They also might soon be a thing of the past due to cost pressures. If so, we should all think deliberately about other ways hospitals can preserve and enhance the social fabric of what is becoming a more segregated medical staff as doctors narrow their sites of care and specialty focus.

The Universal Admitter

The most effective way to eliminate disagreements in admission decisions is to have the hospitalist admit all of them—that is, make the hospitalist a universal admitter.

Some hospitalist groups are nearly universal admitters already. No, they aren’t admitting all patients, including women in labor and some others. But they do admit and serve as attending for patients with hip fractures and other trauma and surgical issues, scheduled chemotherapy patients, etc.

I’ll save of my comments about the appropriateness of hospitalists as universal admitters for a future column. But I think that it is overkill to move to that model solely to address disagreements regarding which group admits a patient.

Service Agreements

Another way to reduce conflict over which physician group will serve as admitting/attending physician is to develop service agreements, or “compacts,” between different specialties. The idea is to create a set of clear, written guidelines or rules that determine which group admits the patient. For example, should the hospitalist or the surgeon admit?

ED doctors usually are delighted when the hospitalists and surgeons have met to create such an agreement. It could mean the end of disputes about who admits the patient. But does it?

I’ll discuss these agreements further in next month’s column, including elements that should be addressed, how to maximize compliance with them, and why they almost always fall short of realizing their hoped-for potential.

Dr. Nelson has been a practicing hospitalist since 1988. He is co-founder and past president of SHM, and principal in Nelson Flores Hospital Medicine Consultants. He is co-director for SHM’s “Best Practices in Managing a Hospital Medicine Program” course.

John Nelson, MD, MHM

Editor’s note: First of a two-part series.

Think about the last time you found yourself in the middle of a contentious conversation with another doctor about whether a patient should be admitted by you, the hospitalist, or by a doctor in another specialty. Such conversations can sometimes move quickly from respectful disagreement to posturing, drawing lines in the sand, or worse.

Respectful conversations between doctors with differing opinions about the best plan of care for patients are valuable. But disagreements that lead doctors to talk at rather than with each other risk creating quality-of-care issues for the patient, demoralize other hospital staff, and can result in lasting harm to the relationship between the doctors involved. I’d bet the frequency of such disputes could serve as a reliable predictor of overall quality of care, and might correlate with cost of care. Doctors in all specialties should work diligently to reduce the chance that such conversations lead to conflict and stress.

Middle Manager

This conflict arises most often when an ED doctor is calling about a patient needing admission; the way communication between ED doctors and other physicians happens nearly everywhere is one reason the problem is so difficult to eradicate. (To be clear, I’m not faulting ED doctors for causing this problem; I think they usually try very hard to prevent it.)

Because the ED doctor is often in the middle of the chain of communication (disagreement), those whom the ED doctor is asking to admit the patient often are emboldened to take more unreasonable or extreme positions. It is a lot easier for Dr. Perry to make a case to the ED doctors that Dr. Mercury should admit a patient than to present the same rationale to Dr. Mercury himself. In many cases, the ED doctors can make the problem go away, or at least extricate themselves from the disagreement, by insisting that Dr. Perry and Dr. Mercury speak directly to each other.

Of course, things can sometimes go so badly that they refuse to speak directly with one another and force the ED doctor to settle the dispute a power given to the ED doctor by the medical staff bylaws at nearly every hospital. Or maybe they do speak directly and that leads to greater conflict (i.e. shouting or an abrupt hang-up).

Improved Social Connections

Most hospitals I’ve worked with seem to feature harmonious and collegial relationships between the ED doctors, hospitalists, and other specialties. But for some, divisive conflict crops up frequently. A first step for those hospitals laden with conflict could be to deliberately work to improve the social connections between the physician groups that often disagree. I’m not Pollyannaish; sometimes relationships are beyond repair, or one of the doctors involved might have a character disorder that requires more significant interventions.

A few years ago, I visited a place where years of conflict between ED doctors and hospitalists had led to remarkably adversarial relationships. Both of the lead physicians for the ED doctors and hospitalists were pleasant, professional, and highly regarded by others. Nonetheless, they both were fed up with the ongoing conflict and found themselves in such an adversarial relationship that I worried the next nighttime dispute could come to blows (literally). With a combination of support and pressure from hospital leaders and physician peers, they committed to a series of dinner meetings, just the two of them. They agreed to meet monthly, away from the hospital, and for the first few meetings avoid any conversation about work-related issues. The point was for them to build social connections so that they could find new ways of communicating, thus regain respect for the character of the other.

Some months later, I heard from the lead hospitalist, who said that the meetings had proven very valuable and things had improved dramatically between the department heads. He also said they were working together to improve the way their whole groups interacted. This wouldn’t work so well everywhere, and would have failed if not for the good character of both the doctors. But I’m struck by how infrequently the formation of social ties is included in any plan to reduce physician conflict. It is valuable, regardless of which specialties the doctors work in.

Hospitals have figured this out. Most provide a doctor’s lounge where meals might be served to provide a place for socialization. Some arrange periodic retreats for physician and hospital leaders to spend a weekend in a nice setting (with some time devoted to business and ample time for recreation and socialization). Expensive “perks” like these probably pay dividends in improving culture and reducing conflict. They also might soon be a thing of the past due to cost pressures. If so, we should all think deliberately about other ways hospitals can preserve and enhance the social fabric of what is becoming a more segregated medical staff as doctors narrow their sites of care and specialty focus.

The Universal Admitter

The most effective way to eliminate disagreements in admission decisions is to have the hospitalist admit all of them—that is, make the hospitalist a universal admitter.

Some hospitalist groups are nearly universal admitters already. No, they aren’t admitting all patients, including women in labor and some others. But they do admit and serve as attending for patients with hip fractures and other trauma and surgical issues, scheduled chemotherapy patients, etc.

I’ll save of my comments about the appropriateness of hospitalists as universal admitters for a future column. But I think that it is overkill to move to that model solely to address disagreements regarding which group admits a patient.

Service Agreements

Another way to reduce conflict over which physician group will serve as admitting/attending physician is to develop service agreements, or “compacts,” between different specialties. The idea is to create a set of clear, written guidelines or rules that determine which group admits the patient. For example, should the hospitalist or the surgeon admit?

ED doctors usually are delighted when the hospitalists and surgeons have met to create such an agreement. It could mean the end of disputes about who admits the patient. But does it?

I’ll discuss these agreements further in next month’s column, including elements that should be addressed, how to maximize compliance with them, and why they almost always fall short of realizing their hoped-for potential.

Dr. Nelson has been a practicing hospitalist since 1988. He is co-founder and past president of SHM, and principal in Nelson Flores Hospital Medicine Consultants. He is co-director for SHM’s “Best Practices in Managing a Hospital Medicine Program” course.

John Nelson, MD, MHM

Editor’s note: First of a two-part series.

Think about the last time you found yourself in the middle of a contentious conversation with another doctor about whether a patient should be admitted by you, the hospitalist, or by a doctor in another specialty. Such conversations can sometimes move quickly from respectful disagreement to posturing, drawing lines in the sand, or worse.

Respectful conversations between doctors with differing opinions about the best plan of care for patients are valuable. But disagreements that lead doctors to talk at rather than with each other risk creating quality-of-care issues for the patient, demoralize other hospital staff, and can result in lasting harm to the relationship between the doctors involved. I’d bet the frequency of such disputes could serve as a reliable predictor of overall quality of care, and might correlate with cost of care. Doctors in all specialties should work diligently to reduce the chance that such conversations lead to conflict and stress.

Middle Manager

This conflict arises most often when an ED doctor is calling about a patient needing admission; the way communication between ED doctors and other physicians happens nearly everywhere is one reason the problem is so difficult to eradicate. (To be clear, I’m not faulting ED doctors for causing this problem; I think they usually try very hard to prevent it.)

Because the ED doctor is often in the middle of the chain of communication (disagreement), those whom the ED doctor is asking to admit the patient often are emboldened to take more unreasonable or extreme positions. It is a lot easier for Dr. Perry to make a case to the ED doctors that Dr. Mercury should admit a patient than to present the same rationale to Dr. Mercury himself. In many cases, the ED doctors can make the problem go away, or at least extricate themselves from the disagreement, by insisting that Dr. Perry and Dr. Mercury speak directly to each other.

Of course, things can sometimes go so badly that they refuse to speak directly with one another and force the ED doctor to settle the dispute a power given to the ED doctor by the medical staff bylaws at nearly every hospital. Or maybe they do speak directly and that leads to greater conflict (i.e. shouting or an abrupt hang-up).

Improved Social Connections

Most hospitals I’ve worked with seem to feature harmonious and collegial relationships between the ED doctors, hospitalists, and other specialties. But for some, divisive conflict crops up frequently. A first step for those hospitals laden with conflict could be to deliberately work to improve the social connections between the physician groups that often disagree. I’m not Pollyannaish; sometimes relationships are beyond repair, or one of the doctors involved might have a character disorder that requires more significant interventions.

A few years ago, I visited a place where years of conflict between ED doctors and hospitalists had led to remarkably adversarial relationships. Both of the lead physicians for the ED doctors and hospitalists were pleasant, professional, and highly regarded by others. Nonetheless, they both were fed up with the ongoing conflict and found themselves in such an adversarial relationship that I worried the next nighttime dispute could come to blows (literally). With a combination of support and pressure from hospital leaders and physician peers, they committed to a series of dinner meetings, just the two of them. They agreed to meet monthly, away from the hospital, and for the first few meetings avoid any conversation about work-related issues. The point was for them to build social connections so that they could find new ways of communicating, thus regain respect for the character of the other.

Some months later, I heard from the lead hospitalist, who said that the meetings had proven very valuable and things had improved dramatically between the department heads. He also said they were working together to improve the way their whole groups interacted. This wouldn’t work so well everywhere, and would have failed if not for the good character of both the doctors. But I’m struck by how infrequently the formation of social ties is included in any plan to reduce physician conflict. It is valuable, regardless of which specialties the doctors work in.

Hospitals have figured this out. Most provide a doctor’s lounge where meals might be served to provide a place for socialization. Some arrange periodic retreats for physician and hospital leaders to spend a weekend in a nice setting (with some time devoted to business and ample time for recreation and socialization). Expensive “perks” like these probably pay dividends in improving culture and reducing conflict. They also might soon be a thing of the past due to cost pressures. If so, we should all think deliberately about other ways hospitals can preserve and enhance the social fabric of what is becoming a more segregated medical staff as doctors narrow their sites of care and specialty focus.

The Universal Admitter

The most effective way to eliminate disagreements in admission decisions is to have the hospitalist admit all of them—that is, make the hospitalist a universal admitter.

Some hospitalist groups are nearly universal admitters already. No, they aren’t admitting all patients, including women in labor and some others. But they do admit and serve as attending for patients with hip fractures and other trauma and surgical issues, scheduled chemotherapy patients, etc.

I’ll save of my comments about the appropriateness of hospitalists as universal admitters for a future column. But I think that it is overkill to move to that model solely to address disagreements regarding which group admits a patient.

Service Agreements

Another way to reduce conflict over which physician group will serve as admitting/attending physician is to develop service agreements, or “compacts,” between different specialties. The idea is to create a set of clear, written guidelines or rules that determine which group admits the patient. For example, should the hospitalist or the surgeon admit?

ED doctors usually are delighted when the hospitalists and surgeons have met to create such an agreement. It could mean the end of disputes about who admits the patient. But does it?

I’ll discuss these agreements further in next month’s column, including elements that should be addressed, how to maximize compliance with them, and why they almost always fall short of realizing their hoped-for potential.

Dr. Nelson has been a practicing hospitalist since 1988. He is co-founder and past president of SHM, and principal in Nelson Flores Hospital Medicine Consultants. He is co-director for SHM’s “Best Practices in Managing a Hospital Medicine Program” course.

Dr. Hospitalist

Medicine’s Evolution Shouldn’t Undermine Your Expertise, Autonomy, Professionalism

I’m a career hospitalist, yet I struggle to define my role in medicine. Am I still a professional even though I do shift work?

—Randy Robison, DO, Plano, Texas

Dr. Hospitalist responds:

Simple question. The short answer is “yes.” The long answer is as follows, so stay with me as we go on a bit of a tangent.

Physicians historically have been categorized as independent professionals, and that was never more true than when most physicians operated in small or solo practices. If you go back even further than that, historically, the three “learned professions” are divinity, medicine, and law. A rough definition encompasses the idea of standard training, a regulatory body (or bodies), and a code of ethics.

Without arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, let’s translate the idea of a profession into something equating autonomy. Professional autonomy can come in many forms. Decision-making at the bedside is a prime example. From a clinical perspective, the advances that we have made in evidence-based medicine are laudable. While some might view the advent of protocols as constraining, I think it allows for a clearer application of science while leaving the art of medicine in the hands of the individual. Others will counter that there’s too much Ritz-Carlton training going on for physicians now, reducing the autonomy of the individual practitioner.

On some level, I’ve been hearing about the “loss of professionalism” in medicine since the day I entered medical school. That said, as a hospitalist in the field of internal medicine, there is not a day that goes by when I don’t have a clinical question with several possible “right” answers. At the same time, there are often varying communication approaches to the patient as well, based on gender, age, education, ethnicity, values, and so on. So I don’t get the sense that autonomy is dead.

There is no doubt that we live in a time of great upheaval in healthcare. Any significant changes can be threatening, especially to a professional. It’s even harder when that independent professional depends on the government as both their greatest source of income and regulation. “Government functionary” and “independent professional” are not exactly ringing synonyms.

Yes, the payment system is in flux. Yes, there is less true autonomy than 20 years ago, and maybe that’s a good thing for our patients. Yes, there are greater expectations for behavior or customer service. Yes, more of us do shift work of some sort than we did before.

Still, there’s no reason to be a lackey, and there’s no reason not to take pride in what you do. Consider these conflicting statements: Show up on time. Question authority. Dress worthy of your calling. Be an individual. Honor the data. Know your own opinion.

At the end of the day, each patient needs you. They need your knowledge, your compassion, your time, and your commitment. It has nothing to do with when your shift starts or when it ends. It has everything to do with the pride you take in your profession. Every patient who has an encounter with a hospitalist should come away thinking, “Wow, that physician is really on the ball. They know all the recent data, they treat me with courtesy and respect, and they have a personality to boot.”

No one should think you’re there just to finish your shift.

Dr. Hospitalist

Medicine’s Evolution Shouldn’t Undermine Your Expertise, Autonomy, Professionalism

I’m a career hospitalist, yet I struggle to define my role in medicine. Am I still a professional even though I do shift work?

—Randy Robison, DO, Plano, Texas

Dr. Hospitalist responds:

Simple question. The short answer is “yes.” The long answer is as follows, so stay with me as we go on a bit of a tangent.

Physicians historically have been categorized as independent professionals, and that was never more true than when most physicians operated in small or solo practices. If you go back even further than that, historically, the three “learned professions” are divinity, medicine, and law. A rough definition encompasses the idea of standard training, a regulatory body (or bodies), and a code of ethics.

Without arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, let’s translate the idea of a profession into something equating autonomy. Professional autonomy can come in many forms. Decision-making at the bedside is a prime example. From a clinical perspective, the advances that we have made in evidence-based medicine are laudable. While some might view the advent of protocols as constraining, I think it allows for a clearer application of science while leaving the art of medicine in the hands of the individual. Others will counter that there’s too much Ritz-Carlton training going on for physicians now, reducing the autonomy of the individual practitioner.

On some level, I’ve been hearing about the “loss of professionalism” in medicine since the day I entered medical school. That said, as a hospitalist in the field of internal medicine, there is not a day that goes by when I don’t have a clinical question with several possible “right” answers. At the same time, there are often varying communication approaches to the patient as well, based on gender, age, education, ethnicity, values, and so on. So I don’t get the sense that autonomy is dead.

There is no doubt that we live in a time of great upheaval in healthcare. Any significant changes can be threatening, especially to a professional. It’s even harder when that independent professional depends on the government as both their greatest source of income and regulation. “Government functionary” and “independent professional” are not exactly ringing synonyms.

Yes, the payment system is in flux. Yes, there is less true autonomy than 20 years ago, and maybe that’s a good thing for our patients. Yes, there are greater expectations for behavior or customer service. Yes, more of us do shift work of some sort than we did before.

Still, there’s no reason to be a lackey, and there’s no reason not to take pride in what you do. Consider these conflicting statements: Show up on time. Question authority. Dress worthy of your calling. Be an individual. Honor the data. Know your own opinion.

At the end of the day, each patient needs you. They need your knowledge, your compassion, your time, and your commitment. It has nothing to do with when your shift starts or when it ends. It has everything to do with the pride you take in your profession. Every patient who has an encounter with a hospitalist should come away thinking, “Wow, that physician is really on the ball. They know all the recent data, they treat me with courtesy and respect, and they have a personality to boot.”

No one should think you’re there just to finish your shift.

Dr. Hospitalist

Medicine’s Evolution Shouldn’t Undermine Your Expertise, Autonomy, Professionalism

I’m a career hospitalist, yet I struggle to define my role in medicine. Am I still a professional even though I do shift work?

—Randy Robison, DO, Plano, Texas

Dr. Hospitalist responds:

Simple question. The short answer is “yes.” The long answer is as follows, so stay with me as we go on a bit of a tangent.

Physicians historically have been categorized as independent professionals, and that was never more true than when most physicians operated in small or solo practices. If you go back even further than that, historically, the three “learned professions” are divinity, medicine, and law. A rough definition encompasses the idea of standard training, a regulatory body (or bodies), and a code of ethics.

Without arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, let’s translate the idea of a profession into something equating autonomy. Professional autonomy can come in many forms. Decision-making at the bedside is a prime example. From a clinical perspective, the advances that we have made in evidence-based medicine are laudable. While some might view the advent of protocols as constraining, I think it allows for a clearer application of science while leaving the art of medicine in the hands of the individual. Others will counter that there’s too much Ritz-Carlton training going on for physicians now, reducing the autonomy of the individual practitioner.

On some level, I’ve been hearing about the “loss of professionalism” in medicine since the day I entered medical school. That said, as a hospitalist in the field of internal medicine, there is not a day that goes by when I don’t have a clinical question with several possible “right” answers. At the same time, there are often varying communication approaches to the patient as well, based on gender, age, education, ethnicity, values, and so on. So I don’t get the sense that autonomy is dead.

There is no doubt that we live in a time of great upheaval in healthcare. Any significant changes can be threatening, especially to a professional. It’s even harder when that independent professional depends on the government as both their greatest source of income and regulation. “Government functionary” and “independent professional” are not exactly ringing synonyms.

Yes, the payment system is in flux. Yes, there is less true autonomy than 20 years ago, and maybe that’s a good thing for our patients. Yes, there are greater expectations for behavior or customer service. Yes, more of us do shift work of some sort than we did before.

Still, there’s no reason to be a lackey, and there’s no reason not to take pride in what you do. Consider these conflicting statements: Show up on time. Question authority. Dress worthy of your calling. Be an individual. Honor the data. Know your own opinion.

At the end of the day, each patient needs you. They need your knowledge, your compassion, your time, and your commitment. It has nothing to do with when your shift starts or when it ends. It has everything to do with the pride you take in your profession. Every patient who has an encounter with a hospitalist should come away thinking, “Wow, that physician is really on the ball. They know all the recent data, they treat me with courtesy and respect, and they have a personality to boot.”

No one should think you’re there just to finish your shift.

The term “patient-centered medical home” has a nice ring to it, but what does it really mean? And how does it function in the real world? The model is evolving, but here are the main components of the PCMH and how they’ve been implemented in real practice, at least so far:

“PERSONAL” PHYSICIAN: This is the doctor, usually a family or general practice physician, who shepherds patients through the medical system. In practice, this means things like encouraging patient questions about their care, extra efforts to educate patients on their health, and nurses making detailed follow-up calls with patients to make sure they’ve gotten their medications and know how to take them, and communicating any other steps the patient should be taking.

“Whole-person orientation”: The personal physician is responsible for taking care of all of the patient’s medical needs, either himself or by arranging care with specialists. The care ranges from preventive to chronic to end-of-life. In practice, this often means having appointments made with another doctor, if necessary, before the patient leaves the primary-care doctor, or seeing several doctors of different specialties during the same appointment.

Coordinated or integrated care: Care in the PCMH spans all aspects of the healthcare system, from subspecialists to the hospital to the nursing home. In practice, this means the use of electronic registries and health information exchange systems to make sure every health professional has all the information they should have about the patient.

Quality and safety: In practice, it means the development of a care plan that is bolstered by close relationships between patients, doctors, and family members. Plus, a good PCMH will have a more collegial atmosphere, with regular meetings among doctors of varying specialties. Evidence-based medicine is the guide. And feedback from the patient is sought more aggressively. Practices also can undergo a voluntary recognition process by a non-government-related healthcare quality organization, such as the National Committee for Quality Assurance.

Enhanced access: So that patients get the care when they need it, same-day scheduling is often offered. There are expanded hours, and phone and email communication is used more often.

Payment: The payment system in a PCMH encourages better primary care and prevention of illness. Still, most PCMH practices currently use a blend of fee-for-service, a monthly “care coordination” fee, and incentives for quality care.

Source: Adapted from 2007’s Joint Statement on Patient-Centered Medical Home, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality

The term “patient-centered medical home” has a nice ring to it, but what does it really mean? And how does it function in the real world? The model is evolving, but here are the main components of the PCMH and how they’ve been implemented in real practice, at least so far:

“PERSONAL” PHYSICIAN: This is the doctor, usually a family or general practice physician, who shepherds patients through the medical system. In practice, this means things like encouraging patient questions about their care, extra efforts to educate patients on their health, and nurses making detailed follow-up calls with patients to make sure they’ve gotten their medications and know how to take them, and communicating any other steps the patient should be taking.

“Whole-person orientation”: The personal physician is responsible for taking care of all of the patient’s medical needs, either himself or by arranging care with specialists. The care ranges from preventive to chronic to end-of-life. In practice, this often means having appointments made with another doctor, if necessary, before the patient leaves the primary-care doctor, or seeing several doctors of different specialties during the same appointment.

Coordinated or integrated care: Care in the PCMH spans all aspects of the healthcare system, from subspecialists to the hospital to the nursing home. In practice, this means the use of electronic registries and health information exchange systems to make sure every health professional has all the information they should have about the patient.

Quality and safety: In practice, it means the development of a care plan that is bolstered by close relationships between patients, doctors, and family members. Plus, a good PCMH will have a more collegial atmosphere, with regular meetings among doctors of varying specialties. Evidence-based medicine is the guide. And feedback from the patient is sought more aggressively. Practices also can undergo a voluntary recognition process by a non-government-related healthcare quality organization, such as the National Committee for Quality Assurance.

Enhanced access: So that patients get the care when they need it, same-day scheduling is often offered. There are expanded hours, and phone and email communication is used more often.

Payment: The payment system in a PCMH encourages better primary care and prevention of illness. Still, most PCMH practices currently use a blend of fee-for-service, a monthly “care coordination” fee, and incentives for quality care.

Source: Adapted from 2007’s Joint Statement on Patient-Centered Medical Home, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality

The term “patient-centered medical home” has a nice ring to it, but what does it really mean? And how does it function in the real world? The model is evolving, but here are the main components of the PCMH and how they’ve been implemented in real practice, at least so far:

“PERSONAL” PHYSICIAN: This is the doctor, usually a family or general practice physician, who shepherds patients through the medical system. In practice, this means things like encouraging patient questions about their care, extra efforts to educate patients on their health, and nurses making detailed follow-up calls with patients to make sure they’ve gotten their medications and know how to take them, and communicating any other steps the patient should be taking.

“Whole-person orientation”: The personal physician is responsible for taking care of all of the patient’s medical needs, either himself or by arranging care with specialists. The care ranges from preventive to chronic to end-of-life. In practice, this often means having appointments made with another doctor, if necessary, before the patient leaves the primary-care doctor, or seeing several doctors of different specialties during the same appointment.

Coordinated or integrated care: Care in the PCMH spans all aspects of the healthcare system, from subspecialists to the hospital to the nursing home. In practice, this means the use of electronic registries and health information exchange systems to make sure every health professional has all the information they should have about the patient.

Quality and safety: In practice, it means the development of a care plan that is bolstered by close relationships between patients, doctors, and family members. Plus, a good PCMH will have a more collegial atmosphere, with regular meetings among doctors of varying specialties. Evidence-based medicine is the guide. And feedback from the patient is sought more aggressively. Practices also can undergo a voluntary recognition process by a non-government-related healthcare quality organization, such as the National Committee for Quality Assurance.

Enhanced access: So that patients get the care when they need it, same-day scheduling is often offered. There are expanded hours, and phone and email communication is used more often.

Payment: The payment system in a PCMH encourages better primary care and prevention of illness. Still, most PCMH practices currently use a blend of fee-for-service, a monthly “care coordination” fee, and incentives for quality care.

Source: Adapted from 2007’s Joint Statement on Patient-Centered Medical Home, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality

If the “patient-centered medical home” model does what it intends to do—makes people healthier and limits preventable illness—fewer people will likely be hospitalized. Should hospitalists be worried? Will that mean less work for hospitalists?

“That clearly is one potential implication of many of the different healthcare reform models, including the development of primary-care medical homes and folks out there who are participating in accountable-care organizations [ACOs], all of which are designed to provide better access to patients on an outpatient setting,” SHM immediate past president Joseph Ming Wah Li, MD, SFHM, says. “The rationale is that it should ultimately lead to fewer hospitalizations.”

Dr. Li

Most hospitalists, Dr. Li adds, will say that’s a good thing.

“You’re never going to argue against” fewer hospitalizations, he says. “I think what hospitalists will have to do is they will have to adapt.”

Ultimately, patients who are hospitalized will be sicker, and hospitalists likely will end up seeing those patients several times a day rather than just once or twice, Dr. Li says.

Dr. Meyers, of AHRQ, says inpatient care in the future could become more meaningful, because while there may be fewer patients, those who are hospitalized will need more complex care management.

“I think America’s a big enough country, though, where with an aging population—and we still have lots of chronic disease—there’s going to be no shortage of work, meaningful work, for hospitalists moving forward,” he says.

Dr. Eichhorn, who works in an already up-and-running PCMH system, says patient census shouldn’t be a concern.

“Most hospitalists would probably say that they have plenty of work,” Dr. Eichhorn says. “I think anything that we can do to prevent a hospital stay certainly promotes health and allows us to be better stewards of healthcare resources. And I think it’s a win for everyone.”

If the “patient-centered medical home” model does what it intends to do—makes people healthier and limits preventable illness—fewer people will likely be hospitalized. Should hospitalists be worried? Will that mean less work for hospitalists?

“That clearly is one potential implication of many of the different healthcare reform models, including the development of primary-care medical homes and folks out there who are participating in accountable-care organizations [ACOs], all of which are designed to provide better access to patients on an outpatient setting,” SHM immediate past president Joseph Ming Wah Li, MD, SFHM, says. “The rationale is that it should ultimately lead to fewer hospitalizations.”

Dr. Li

Most hospitalists, Dr. Li adds, will say that’s a good thing.

“You’re never going to argue against” fewer hospitalizations, he says. “I think what hospitalists will have to do is they will have to adapt.”

Ultimately, patients who are hospitalized will be sicker, and hospitalists likely will end up seeing those patients several times a day rather than just once or twice, Dr. Li says.

Dr. Meyers, of AHRQ, says inpatient care in the future could become more meaningful, because while there may be fewer patients, those who are hospitalized will need more complex care management.

“I think America’s a big enough country, though, where with an aging population—and we still have lots of chronic disease—there’s going to be no shortage of work, meaningful work, for hospitalists moving forward,” he says.

Dr. Eichhorn, who works in an already up-and-running PCMH system, says patient census shouldn’t be a concern.

“Most hospitalists would probably say that they have plenty of work,” Dr. Eichhorn says. “I think anything that we can do to prevent a hospital stay certainly promotes health and allows us to be better stewards of healthcare resources. And I think it’s a win for everyone.”

If the “patient-centered medical home” model does what it intends to do—makes people healthier and limits preventable illness—fewer people will likely be hospitalized. Should hospitalists be worried? Will that mean less work for hospitalists?

“That clearly is one potential implication of many of the different healthcare reform models, including the development of primary-care medical homes and folks out there who are participating in accountable-care organizations [ACOs], all of which are designed to provide better access to patients on an outpatient setting,” SHM immediate past president Joseph Ming Wah Li, MD, SFHM, says. “The rationale is that it should ultimately lead to fewer hospitalizations.”

Dr. Li

Most hospitalists, Dr. Li adds, will say that’s a good thing.

“You’re never going to argue against” fewer hospitalizations, he says. “I think what hospitalists will have to do is they will have to adapt.”

Ultimately, patients who are hospitalized will be sicker, and hospitalists likely will end up seeing those patients several times a day rather than just once or twice, Dr. Li says.

Dr. Meyers, of AHRQ, says inpatient care in the future could become more meaningful, because while there may be fewer patients, those who are hospitalized will need more complex care management.

“I think America’s a big enough country, though, where with an aging population—and we still have lots of chronic disease—there’s going to be no shortage of work, meaningful work, for hospitalists moving forward,” he says.

Dr. Eichhorn, who works in an already up-and-running PCMH system, says patient census shouldn’t be a concern.

“Most hospitalists would probably say that they have plenty of work,” Dr. Eichhorn says. “I think anything that we can do to prevent a hospital stay certainly promotes health and allows us to be better stewards of healthcare resources. And I think it’s a win for everyone.”

Louis O’Boyle, DO, FACP, FHM, says hospitalists with an entrepreneurial bent can use flexibility and creativity to design HM programs that meet the unique needs of small or rural hospitals. He owns a hospitalist practice, Advanced Inpatient Medicine, which serves 98-bed Wayne Memorial Hospital in Honesdale, Pa., population 4,874.

“In 2006, the largest group of community physicians locally said they were not going to do hospital coverage or take unassigned hospitalized patients anymore,” Dr. O’Boyle says. The hospital first brought in an out-of-town consultant to provide hospitalist services, but in 2009, Dr. O’Boyle seized the opportunity to fill the need. He formed his own company, which employs five hospitalists providing 24/7 coverage (clinicians rotate between 8 a.m.-to-4 p.m. shifts and 4 p.m.-to-8 a.m. shifts). The hospitalist on duty can often go home after the ED slows down, he says, although hiring a sixth hospitalist would make it easier to provide a 24-hour presence.

Dr. O'Boyle

“Our hospitalists see an average of 12 patients a day, so we’re not running too hard. You can take time to do a good job, and still have supper with your kids some workdays. In a rural area, you can still get away with that,” Dr. O’Boyle says. “We have a good salary, work schedule, and caseload. We have a great team, with everyone on board with what we’re trying to do.”

Members of Dr. O’Boyle’s group sit on all of the hospital’s committees. Many have a say in changes that go on at the hospital. The group is active in quality and safety projects and research on readmission rates. The program has been so successful that he is negotiating to cover several other hospitals in the region.

“Another key to the success of this program is our fiscal responsibility, demonstrating the value we bring to the hospital,” he says. “We align our goals with the hospital’s goals. We have cut length of stay by an average of three-quarters of a day. We were very involved with the IT department in setting up EHR and CPOE to our specifications. There is a whole list of things we do to justify our worth, and our subsidy payment from the hospital is particularly low.”

Dr. O’Boyle, in addition to his practice-management responsibilities, works alongside his colleagues. “It’s not like I’m the boss—more like I’m first among equals,” he says. “We meet as a team once a month.”

Louis O’Boyle, DO, FACP, FHM, says hospitalists with an entrepreneurial bent can use flexibility and creativity to design HM programs that meet the unique needs of small or rural hospitals. He owns a hospitalist practice, Advanced Inpatient Medicine, which serves 98-bed Wayne Memorial Hospital in Honesdale, Pa., population 4,874.

“In 2006, the largest group of community physicians locally said they were not going to do hospital coverage or take unassigned hospitalized patients anymore,” Dr. O’Boyle says. The hospital first brought in an out-of-town consultant to provide hospitalist services, but in 2009, Dr. O’Boyle seized the opportunity to fill the need. He formed his own company, which employs five hospitalists providing 24/7 coverage (clinicians rotate between 8 a.m.-to-4 p.m. shifts and 4 p.m.-to-8 a.m. shifts). The hospitalist on duty can often go home after the ED slows down, he says, although hiring a sixth hospitalist would make it easier to provide a 24-hour presence.

Dr. O'Boyle

“Our hospitalists see an average of 12 patients a day, so we’re not running too hard. You can take time to do a good job, and still have supper with your kids some workdays. In a rural area, you can still get away with that,” Dr. O’Boyle says. “We have a good salary, work schedule, and caseload. We have a great team, with everyone on board with what we’re trying to do.”

Members of Dr. O’Boyle’s group sit on all of the hospital’s committees. Many have a say in changes that go on at the hospital. The group is active in quality and safety projects and research on readmission rates. The program has been so successful that he is negotiating to cover several other hospitals in the region.

“Another key to the success of this program is our fiscal responsibility, demonstrating the value we bring to the hospital,” he says. “We align our goals with the hospital’s goals. We have cut length of stay by an average of three-quarters of a day. We were very involved with the IT department in setting up EHR and CPOE to our specifications. There is a whole list of things we do to justify our worth, and our subsidy payment from the hospital is particularly low.”

Dr. O’Boyle, in addition to his practice-management responsibilities, works alongside his colleagues. “It’s not like I’m the boss—more like I’m first among equals,” he says. “We meet as a team once a month.”

Louis O’Boyle, DO, FACP, FHM, says hospitalists with an entrepreneurial bent can use flexibility and creativity to design HM programs that meet the unique needs of small or rural hospitals. He owns a hospitalist practice, Advanced Inpatient Medicine, which serves 98-bed Wayne Memorial Hospital in Honesdale, Pa., population 4,874.

“In 2006, the largest group of community physicians locally said they were not going to do hospital coverage or take unassigned hospitalized patients anymore,” Dr. O’Boyle says. The hospital first brought in an out-of-town consultant to provide hospitalist services, but in 2009, Dr. O’Boyle seized the opportunity to fill the need. He formed his own company, which employs five hospitalists providing 24/7 coverage (clinicians rotate between 8 a.m.-to-4 p.m. shifts and 4 p.m.-to-8 a.m. shifts). The hospitalist on duty can often go home after the ED slows down, he says, although hiring a sixth hospitalist would make it easier to provide a 24-hour presence.

Dr. O'Boyle

“Our hospitalists see an average of 12 patients a day, so we’re not running too hard. You can take time to do a good job, and still have supper with your kids some workdays. In a rural area, you can still get away with that,” Dr. O’Boyle says. “We have a good salary, work schedule, and caseload. We have a great team, with everyone on board with what we’re trying to do.”

Members of Dr. O’Boyle’s group sit on all of the hospital’s committees. Many have a say in changes that go on at the hospital. The group is active in quality and safety projects and research on readmission rates. The program has been so successful that he is negotiating to cover several other hospitals in the region.

“Another key to the success of this program is our fiscal responsibility, demonstrating the value we bring to the hospital,” he says. “We align our goals with the hospital’s goals. We have cut length of stay by an average of three-quarters of a day. We were very involved with the IT department in setting up EHR and CPOE to our specifications. There is a whole list of things we do to justify our worth, and our subsidy payment from the hospital is particularly low.”

Dr. O’Boyle, in addition to his practice-management responsibilities, works alongside his colleagues. “It’s not like I’m the boss—more like I’m first among equals,” he says. “We meet as a team once a month.”

The obstacles faced by healthcare providers and patients in rural areas are vastly different than those in urban areas. Rural Americans face a unique combination of factors that create disparities in healthcare not found in urban areas:

• Only about 10% of physicians practice in rural America despite the fact that nearly one-fourth of the population lives in these areas.
• Rural residents tend to be poorer. On the average, per capita income is $7,417 lower than in urban areas, and rural Americans are more likely to live below the poverty line. The disparity in incomes is even greater for minorities living in rural areas. Nearly 24% of rural children live in poverty.
• Hypertension is higher in rural than urban areas (101.3 per 1,000 individuals in MSAs and 128.8 per 1,000 individuals in non-MSAs).
• 20% of nonmetropolitan counties lack mental health services, compared with 5% of metropolitan counties.
• Medicare payments to rural hospitals and physicians are dramatically less than those to their urban counterparts for equivalent services. And more than 470 rural hospitals have closed in the past 25 years.
• Medicare patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI) who were treated in rural hospitals were less likely than those treated in urban hospitals to receive recommended treatments and had significantly higher adjusted 30-day post-AMI death rates from all causes than those in urban hospitals.
• Rural residents have greater transportation difficulties reaching healthcare providers, often traveling great distances to reach a doctor or hospital.

Source: www.ruralhealthweb.org

The obstacles faced by healthcare providers and patients in rural areas are vastly different than those in urban areas. Rural Americans face a unique combination of factors that create disparities in healthcare not found in urban areas:

• Only about 10% of physicians practice in rural America despite the fact that nearly one-fourth of the population lives in these areas.
• Rural residents tend to be poorer. On the average, per capita income is $7,417 lower than in urban areas, and rural Americans are more likely to live below the poverty line. The disparity in incomes is even greater for minorities living in rural areas. Nearly 24% of rural children live in poverty.
• Hypertension is higher in rural than urban areas (101.3 per 1,000 individuals in MSAs and 128.8 per 1,000 individuals in non-MSAs).
• 20% of nonmetropolitan counties lack mental health services, compared with 5% of metropolitan counties.
• Medicare payments to rural hospitals and physicians are dramatically less than those to their urban counterparts for equivalent services. And more than 470 rural hospitals have closed in the past 25 years.
• Medicare patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI) who were treated in rural hospitals were less likely than those treated in urban hospitals to receive recommended treatments and had significantly higher adjusted 30-day post-AMI death rates from all causes than those in urban hospitals.
• Rural residents have greater transportation difficulties reaching healthcare providers, often traveling great distances to reach a doctor or hospital.

Source: www.ruralhealthweb.org

The obstacles faced by healthcare providers and patients in rural areas are vastly different than those in urban areas. Rural Americans face a unique combination of factors that create disparities in healthcare not found in urban areas:

• Only about 10% of physicians practice in rural America despite the fact that nearly one-fourth of the population lives in these areas.
• Rural residents tend to be poorer. On the average, per capita income is $7,417 lower than in urban areas, and rural Americans are more likely to live below the poverty line. The disparity in incomes is even greater for minorities living in rural areas. Nearly 24% of rural children live in poverty.
• Hypertension is higher in rural than urban areas (101.3 per 1,000 individuals in MSAs and 128.8 per 1,000 individuals in non-MSAs).
• 20% of nonmetropolitan counties lack mental health services, compared with 5% of metropolitan counties.
• Medicare payments to rural hospitals and physicians are dramatically less than those to their urban counterparts for equivalent services. And more than 470 rural hospitals have closed in the past 25 years.
• Medicare patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI) who were treated in rural hospitals were less likely than those treated in urban hospitals to receive recommended treatments and had significantly higher adjusted 30-day post-AMI death rates from all causes than those in urban hospitals.
• Rural residents have greater transportation difficulties reaching healthcare providers, often traveling great distances to reach a doctor or hospital.

Source: www.ruralhealthweb.org

SHM immediate past president Joseph Ming Wah Li, MD, SFHM, practices hospital medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, but Oklahoma is where he grew up, went to medical school, and performed rural rotations. Some parts of hospitalist practice are the same at big and small hospitals, urban and rural settings, he says.

“Recruitment of high-quality physicians is always a challenge,” Dr. Li says. “That’s where SHM can help.”

SHM’s Career Center, official publications, and the SHM annual meeting are excellent avenues for recruitment, Dr. Li says. SHM also offers online practice-management tools and a variety of collaborative resources—SQUINT, a searchable repository of innovative QI methods and systems, and an electronic QI toolkit known as eQUIPS—to help rural hospitalists.

Based in Kansas City, the National Rural Health Association (www.ruralhealthweb.org) provides additional resources for small, rural hospitals. The NRHA is working with the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT and 62 Regional Extension Centers to help rural providers with EHR adoption and implementation, guiding them to meet meaningful-use standards.

“NRHA is a member organization with multiple constituencies,” says Brock Slabach, senior vice president for member services. “If anybody in hospital medicine works in a rural community and wants to connect with an organization like ours, we don’t have a lot of hospitalist members, but we would welcome them.”

SHM immediate past president Joseph Ming Wah Li, MD, SFHM, practices hospital medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, but Oklahoma is where he grew up, went to medical school, and performed rural rotations. Some parts of hospitalist practice are the same at big and small hospitals, urban and rural settings, he says.

“Recruitment of high-quality physicians is always a challenge,” Dr. Li says. “That’s where SHM can help.”

SHM’s Career Center, official publications, and the SHM annual meeting are excellent avenues for recruitment, Dr. Li says. SHM also offers online practice-management tools and a variety of collaborative resources—SQUINT, a searchable repository of innovative QI methods and systems, and an electronic QI toolkit known as eQUIPS—to help rural hospitalists.

Based in Kansas City, the National Rural Health Association (www.ruralhealthweb.org) provides additional resources for small, rural hospitals. The NRHA is working with the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT and 62 Regional Extension Centers to help rural providers with EHR adoption and implementation, guiding them to meet meaningful-use standards.

“NRHA is a member organization with multiple constituencies,” says Brock Slabach, senior vice president for member services. “If anybody in hospital medicine works in a rural community and wants to connect with an organization like ours, we don’t have a lot of hospitalist members, but we would welcome them.”

SHM immediate past president Joseph Ming Wah Li, MD, SFHM, practices hospital medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, but Oklahoma is where he grew up, went to medical school, and performed rural rotations. Some parts of hospitalist practice are the same at big and small hospitals, urban and rural settings, he says.

“Recruitment of high-quality physicians is always a challenge,” Dr. Li says. “That’s where SHM can help.”

SHM’s Career Center, official publications, and the SHM annual meeting are excellent avenues for recruitment, Dr. Li says. SHM also offers online practice-management tools and a variety of collaborative resources—SQUINT, a searchable repository of innovative QI methods and systems, and an electronic QI toolkit known as eQUIPS—to help rural hospitalists.

Based in Kansas City, the National Rural Health Association (www.ruralhealthweb.org) provides additional resources for small, rural hospitals. The NRHA is working with the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT and 62 Regional Extension Centers to help rural providers with EHR adoption and implementation, guiding them to meet meaningful-use standards.

“NRHA is a member organization with multiple constituencies,” says Brock Slabach, senior vice president for member services. “If anybody in hospital medicine works in a rural community and wants to connect with an organization like ours, we don’t have a lot of hospitalist members, but we would welcome them.”

Medicine in the past 10-20 years has seen major changes driven by changes in payment systems, lifestyle changes, and changes in training patterns. One such change is the hospitalist model of medicine. The advent of hospitalist practice has turned work-life balance on its head, as far as medicine is concerned.

All along, professionalism required that we pay unquestionable attention to the patient, the profession, and the organization—reporting early to work, staying until the work is done, taking work home, and answering the phone on the nights when we were on call. On weekends, finishing pending dictation was normal. The 20-minute mill of outpatient practice has driven primary medicine to a breaking point.

As the pressures of the primary-care job got worse, there came an exit in the form of the hospitalist model. HM provided shift work that could be adjusted to the needs of the physician.

This new kind of job, however, has its own problems. Physicians choosing the normalcy of shift work did not realize that they would give up professional independence. Hospitalists now are governed by the laws of shift work, and at the same time remain governed by the laws of their profession. It is likely when in need they will stay behind and get the work done. And it has been seen that hospitalists do visit the doctors’ lounge, have professional interests outside of direct patient care, and sometimes leave the hospital when their admits and discharges are complete.

And so the shift-work model has, at times, resulted in friction between hospital administration and hospitalists. It could be understood that, from an employer’s perspective, hospitals are paying on an hourly basis and thus expect the hospitalist group to be on site 24/7, sticking around even if there is no work. However, the argument from the hospitalist perspective is that when needed, I stay extra. It should be OK that on low-census days we should be able to leave for a cup of coffee and still be reachable, ready to come in if need arises.

So how do hospitalist-physician professionalism and shift work co-exist? It’s a big question, one that organizations around the country will be looking to solve in the next few years. How this question is answered is going to impact quality of care, recruitment, and staff satisfaction. Each answer will impact the staff and patients.

Keeping in mind outcomes that both parties are looking for, I think a proper plan can be worked out. I suggest hospital administrators adopt the following value-based measurements to evaluate hospitalist clinicians, and establish a compensation system where a minimum amount of production must be met.

Work relative value units (wRVUs). Work RVUs provide a consistent method to measure physician productivity. If one HM clinician’s numbers are below the group average, they might need a lesson in billing, along with a report of their productivity numbers and group expectations.

Patient encounters per day. The average number of patients seen per day (patients seen divided by number of shifts worked) should be measured on a quarterly basis. This metric should provide a measure of the work done by the physician; however, it needs to be offset by your group’s turnover rate (as discussed below).

Length of stay (LOS). Most HM groups are measuring LOS. It is the reason hospitalists exist. Not much more needs to be said about this measure of work performance.

Percentage of patient turnover. A good hospitalist will have a high patient turnover figure (total discharges divided by total encounters per day). This is important to know; it’s even better if accompanied by a short LOS.

New admissions per shift. Again, if there is an outlier, that metric should be detected rather easily.

Patient satisfaction. More and more, this is becoming an important measure of physician quality and is essential for competitive marketplaces. Of course, the quality of medical care will have its own parameters. And it is best left to use the existing, longstanding parameters that are used for the rest of the doctors in your system. There is no need to create an alternative system for the hospitalist.

If all of the above measures are better than the average hospitalist in the locality, then no one should worry about the hospitalist’s other activities, be it involvement in committee work, research, or browsing a newspaper or a cup of coffee in the doctors’ lounge. After all, one of the main reasons physicians opted for HM practice was to have the ability to control their workday.

This will, in my opinion, improve workforce satisfaction and improve productivity. It only makes common sense. It may be a hard pill to swallow for the administrators, but it is the right medicine for the doctor.

Rwoof Reshi, MD, hospitalist, St. Joe’s Hospital, St. Paul, Minn.

Medicine in the past 10-20 years has seen major changes driven by changes in payment systems, lifestyle changes, and changes in training patterns. One such change is the hospitalist model of medicine. The advent of hospitalist practice has turned work-life balance on its head, as far as medicine is concerned.

All along, professionalism required that we pay unquestionable attention to the patient, the profession, and the organization—reporting early to work, staying until the work is done, taking work home, and answering the phone on the nights when we were on call. On weekends, finishing pending dictation was normal. The 20-minute mill of outpatient practice has driven primary medicine to a breaking point.

As the pressures of the primary-care job got worse, there came an exit in the form of the hospitalist model. HM provided shift work that could be adjusted to the needs of the physician.

This new kind of job, however, has its own problems. Physicians choosing the normalcy of shift work did not realize that they would give up professional independence. Hospitalists now are governed by the laws of shift work, and at the same time remain governed by the laws of their profession. It is likely when in need they will stay behind and get the work done. And it has been seen that hospitalists do visit the doctors’ lounge, have professional interests outside of direct patient care, and sometimes leave the hospital when their admits and discharges are complete.

And so the shift-work model has, at times, resulted in friction between hospital administration and hospitalists. It could be understood that, from an employer’s perspective, hospitals are paying on an hourly basis and thus expect the hospitalist group to be on site 24/7, sticking around even if there is no work. However, the argument from the hospitalist perspective is that when needed, I stay extra. It should be OK that on low-census days we should be able to leave for a cup of coffee and still be reachable, ready to come in if need arises.

So how do hospitalist-physician professionalism and shift work co-exist? It’s a big question, one that organizations around the country will be looking to solve in the next few years. How this question is answered is going to impact quality of care, recruitment, and staff satisfaction. Each answer will impact the staff and patients.

Keeping in mind outcomes that both parties are looking for, I think a proper plan can be worked out. I suggest hospital administrators adopt the following value-based measurements to evaluate hospitalist clinicians, and establish a compensation system where a minimum amount of production must be met.

Work relative value units (wRVUs). Work RVUs provide a consistent method to measure physician productivity. If one HM clinician’s numbers are below the group average, they might need a lesson in billing, along with a report of their productivity numbers and group expectations.

Patient encounters per day. The average number of patients seen per day (patients seen divided by number of shifts worked) should be measured on a quarterly basis. This metric should provide a measure of the work done by the physician; however, it needs to be offset by your group’s turnover rate (as discussed below).

Length of stay (LOS). Most HM groups are measuring LOS. It is the reason hospitalists exist. Not much more needs to be said about this measure of work performance.

Percentage of patient turnover. A good hospitalist will have a high patient turnover figure (total discharges divided by total encounters per day). This is important to know; it’s even better if accompanied by a short LOS.

New admissions per shift. Again, if there is an outlier, that metric should be detected rather easily.

Patient satisfaction. More and more, this is becoming an important measure of physician quality and is essential for competitive marketplaces. Of course, the quality of medical care will have its own parameters. And it is best left to use the existing, longstanding parameters that are used for the rest of the doctors in your system. There is no need to create an alternative system for the hospitalist.

If all of the above measures are better than the average hospitalist in the locality, then no one should worry about the hospitalist’s other activities, be it involvement in committee work, research, or browsing a newspaper or a cup of coffee in the doctors’ lounge. After all, one of the main reasons physicians opted for HM practice was to have the ability to control their workday.

This will, in my opinion, improve workforce satisfaction and improve productivity. It only makes common sense. It may be a hard pill to swallow for the administrators, but it is the right medicine for the doctor.

Rwoof Reshi, MD, hospitalist, St. Joe’s Hospital, St. Paul, Minn.

Medicine in the past 10-20 years has seen major changes driven by changes in payment systems, lifestyle changes, and changes in training patterns. One such change is the hospitalist model of medicine. The advent of hospitalist practice has turned work-life balance on its head, as far as medicine is concerned.

All along, professionalism required that we pay unquestionable attention to the patient, the profession, and the organization—reporting early to work, staying until the work is done, taking work home, and answering the phone on the nights when we were on call. On weekends, finishing pending dictation was normal. The 20-minute mill of outpatient practice has driven primary medicine to a breaking point.

As the pressures of the primary-care job got worse, there came an exit in the form of the hospitalist model. HM provided shift work that could be adjusted to the needs of the physician.

This new kind of job, however, has its own problems. Physicians choosing the normalcy of shift work did not realize that they would give up professional independence. Hospitalists now are governed by the laws of shift work, and at the same time remain governed by the laws of their profession. It is likely when in need they will stay behind and get the work done. And it has been seen that hospitalists do visit the doctors’ lounge, have professional interests outside of direct patient care, and sometimes leave the hospital when their admits and discharges are complete.

And so the shift-work model has, at times, resulted in friction between hospital administration and hospitalists. It could be understood that, from an employer’s perspective, hospitals are paying on an hourly basis and thus expect the hospitalist group to be on site 24/7, sticking around even if there is no work. However, the argument from the hospitalist perspective is that when needed, I stay extra. It should be OK that on low-census days we should be able to leave for a cup of coffee and still be reachable, ready to come in if need arises.

So how do hospitalist-physician professionalism and shift work co-exist? It’s a big question, one that organizations around the country will be looking to solve in the next few years. How this question is answered is going to impact quality of care, recruitment, and staff satisfaction. Each answer will impact the staff and patients.

Keeping in mind outcomes that both parties are looking for, I think a proper plan can be worked out. I suggest hospital administrators adopt the following value-based measurements to evaluate hospitalist clinicians, and establish a compensation system where a minimum amount of production must be met.

Work relative value units (wRVUs). Work RVUs provide a consistent method to measure physician productivity. If one HM clinician’s numbers are below the group average, they might need a lesson in billing, along with a report of their productivity numbers and group expectations.

Patient encounters per day. The average number of patients seen per day (patients seen divided by number of shifts worked) should be measured on a quarterly basis. This metric should provide a measure of the work done by the physician; however, it needs to be offset by your group’s turnover rate (as discussed below).

Length of stay (LOS). Most HM groups are measuring LOS. It is the reason hospitalists exist. Not much more needs to be said about this measure of work performance.

Percentage of patient turnover. A good hospitalist will have a high patient turnover figure (total discharges divided by total encounters per day). This is important to know; it’s even better if accompanied by a short LOS.

New admissions per shift. Again, if there is an outlier, that metric should be detected rather easily.

Patient satisfaction. More and more, this is becoming an important measure of physician quality and is essential for competitive marketplaces. Of course, the quality of medical care will have its own parameters. And it is best left to use the existing, longstanding parameters that are used for the rest of the doctors in your system. There is no need to create an alternative system for the hospitalist.

If all of the above measures are better than the average hospitalist in the locality, then no one should worry about the hospitalist’s other activities, be it involvement in committee work, research, or browsing a newspaper or a cup of coffee in the doctors’ lounge. After all, one of the main reasons physicians opted for HM practice was to have the ability to control their workday.

This will, in my opinion, improve workforce satisfaction and improve productivity. It only makes common sense. It may be a hard pill to swallow for the administrators, but it is the right medicine for the doctor.

Rwoof Reshi, MD, hospitalist, St. Joe’s Hospital, St. Paul, Minn.