• Healthcare Solutions
  • Healthcare Overview
  • Emergency Medicine
  • Hospitalist Medicine
  • Urgent Care
  • Wellness Programs
  • Occupational Medicine
  • Medical Homes
• Careers
  • Careers Overview
  • Employment Opportunities
  • Provider Referral Program
• About Us
  • Exigence Overview
  • CEO Message
  • Mission, Vision, Values
  • History
  • Team
  • Exigence Foundation
  • Branded Clothing and Gifts
  • Contact Us
• News
  • Newsworthy
  • Intelligence
• Home

Expert predicts hospitalist trend will grow

12.12.2011

Not every hospital in the country currently employs a hospitalist, but given the benefits of having the professionals on staff and the trends regarding the hiring of these doctors, experts believe that many more soon will.

Dr. John Nelson, a practicing hospitalist and the co-founder and former president of the Society of Hospital Medicine, recently wrote in Hospitalist Magazine that he believes almost no hospitals outside of specialty care organizations will go without at least one hospitalist on staff in the future.

He compared the situation to the development of the emergency care concept that occurred in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Nelson said that many commentators back then said it wasn't clear that every single hospital would have an emergency department staffed by dedicated doctors.

Nelson wrote that some hospitals may employ primary care physicians who can stand in for hospitalists from time to time. But he believes that even these organizations will begin to find it difficult to not have hospitalists on staff.

A recent article in the American Journal of Medicine estimated that there may be up to 30,000 hospitalists practicing in the U.S., though differences in classification make that number hard to pin down. Either way, the number of hospitalists is growing at a rapid clip.
 

Categories: Hospitalist medicine 

Related Articles