The role and impact of hospitalists on modern hospital care

Hospitalists and Hospital Care

Hospitalists are a rapidly growing group of physicians and play a very important role in improving the care delivery system and this occurred after the introduction of the first hospital medicine in the 1990s when they worked as primary care physicians (PCP). (Pham, Grossman, Cohen & Bodenheimer, 2008) The job of PCPs was to provide care to stay-in patients whereas the present Hospitalists fulfil the caring needs of specialty and surgical patients.

For more than twenty years, hospital medicine has prevailed in the U.S. health care systems. And the practitioners of hospital medicine, known as hospitalists have helped the health care system to concentrate more on the quality of care, as compared to its quantity and thus have played a very important role in bringing about several changed in the health care system of the United States (Feldman, 2013). Such quality-based health care is known as 'value-based care'

Trend of Hospitalists:

According to Nabili and Shiel (2014), it has been observed that the trend of hospitalists became more prominent in the U.S. from the year 2004 onwards and many factors influenced the development of this movement: convenience, efficiency, safety of patients, cost-effectiveness for hospitals and the savings for patients (since the primary care doctors were too expensive), and the caring need of the patients who require specialized attention throughout the day. There are several similarities and differences between a hospitalist and an internal medicine doctor. The similarities are that both receive the same training, which includes medical school, residency training and board examination. However, the varying features are that the hospitalists do not practice the traditional methods of medication and prefer the modern medicines. The hospitalists are usually those people who were previously family doctors or medical subspecialists and when they become hospitalists, they take important care-providing roles and become intensive care, speciality doctors, doctors for lungs or for the kidney (pulmonologists or nephrologists respectively).

Role and Impact of Hospitalists on Hospital Care

Hospitalists can be likened to the sand that fills the gaps in a jar filled with pebbles; the jar being symbolised as the amount of care for a patient. Feldman (2013) opines that hospitalists provide greater service and help to patients, as well as to other physicians and nurses. They are an important part of the Health Care Unit as they can take up all kinds of jobs and can take care of a patient when there has been no doctor assigned to it. Since a hospitalist has as much training as any other doctor, they can use their skills to take on a variety of cases e.g. treating paediatric patients or leading a strategic operation in the hospital. They can also work during night hours and thus, extending the care for patients as well providing advice to the nurses.

Hospitals, according to Feldman (2013), can do more than that; they can treat a patient throughout the treatment process. They can care for the patient during emergency, admission, surgery, critical care, and finally, discharge. Not only this, but they can also take charge and do all that is required to push the boundaries of patient-care further.

A number of studies have revealed that the skills and training of hospitalists allows them to impart his knowledge onto others as well. They can teach the nurses, physicians, residents, medical students, administrators as well as patients and act as a mentor to them by educating them. Leadership, as well as awareness functions are being greatly realized by hospitalists within hospitals. Survey-centered research studies established that hospitalists had been rated considerably higher as educationalists when matched to conventional practicing-physicians. The effect of hospitalists as instructors and hospitalist teachers had been established to improve the inpatient encounter for medical students as well as residents. As a result, a hospitalist can improve the quality of a health care unit and provide patient satisfaction (OBHG Marketing, 2015).