"We are the medical police, or MPs, obligated by local, state, and federal government to supervise nonphysician health care professionals, as though our rubber-stamp approval could prevent some unscrupulous occupational therapist from robbing Medicare blind. This is absurd. When the visiting nurse attends a patient in her home, I must sign a form that certifies that the nurse truly was there, guarantees that nursing services were warranted and proper, and verifies that the nursing agency rightfully deserves payment. If a physical therapist is to conduct the craft for which he is well trained, stretching a stiff joint here or mobilizing an elderly stroke victim there, I must sign a form, as though validating his parking stub."
"Why are we so foolishly willing to waste doc-tors’ time and talent on mundane clerical duties? Why did physicians ever allow themselves to be shackled with such nonsense? I was chased out of my own office practice by a rabid fax machine spewing spurious forms for signature."
"the primary care doctor, as guarantor of record, is handed responsibility for any adverse outcome, from wooziness with a head tilt to sudden death under the hair dryer."
We think of physician liability solely as a matter of medical malpractice risk, the wrong drug given to the wrong patient via the wrong route of administration. The primary care physician today, however, is a general liability sink, carrying an obligation as the guarantor of a good day
The nonclinical physician duties, including being a hall monitor, liability sink, and guarantor, are more than a mild inconvenience for physicians. They are a health hazard by distraction, as deadly as chatting on the cell phone while driving. How many iatrogenic errors occur each year because a doctor’s attention is diverted from her primary charge: good direct patient care? There is no way to measure this morbid statistic, but I will wager that forms kill.
Like water, land, and energy, we squander primary care physician man-hours as though we had an infinite supply. We drive doctors out, and ultimately deny our citizens access to care.
"a doctor who at least tries to stay afloat professionally in a world awash in torrents of clinical trials, emerging therapies, and information overload."
There is, however, no diploma suitable for framing that proclaims the doctor a “master of sentience,” compassionate, emotionally intelligent, and perceptive of feeling and human hurt.
"Why are we so foolishly willing to waste doc-tors’ time and talent on mundane clerical duties? Why did physicians ever allow themselves to be shackled with such nonsense? I was chased out of my own office practice by a rabid fax machine spewing spurious forms for signature."
"the primary care doctor, as guarantor of record, is handed responsibility for any adverse outcome, from wooziness with a head tilt to sudden death under the hair dryer."
We think of physician liability solely as a matter of medical malpractice risk, the wrong drug given to the wrong patient via the wrong route of administration. The primary care physician today, however, is a general liability sink, carrying an obligation as the guarantor of a good day
The nonclinical physician duties, including being a hall monitor, liability sink, and guarantor, are more than a mild inconvenience for physicians. They are a health hazard by distraction, as deadly as chatting on the cell phone while driving. How many iatrogenic errors occur each year because a doctor’s attention is diverted from her primary charge: good direct patient care? There is no way to measure this morbid statistic, but I will wager that forms kill.
Like water, land, and energy, we squander primary care physician man-hours as though we had an infinite supply. We drive doctors out, and ultimately deny our citizens access to care.
"a doctor who at least tries to stay afloat professionally in a world awash in torrents of clinical trials, emerging therapies, and information overload."
There is, however, no diploma suitable for framing that proclaims the doctor a “master of sentience,” compassionate, emotionally intelligent, and perceptive of feeling and human hurt.
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