How Obama's Re-election Will Change Medical Practice Staff
How Obama's Re-election Will Change Medical Practice Staff
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It’s official. President Obama has secured another four years in the Oval Office, and with it, healthcare reform. For many practices, that means big staffing changes are on the horizon.
An estimated 30 million people will gain insurance as a result of the Affordable Care Act. At the same time, the Association of American Medical Colleges anticipates a shortfall of 45,000 primary-care physicians and 46,000 specialists in the coming decade.
To deal, practices will need to find new ways to improve and enhance access to patient care — some practices already are.
“We’ve seen [demand for nurse practitioners (NPs) and physician assistants (PAs)] steadily climbing throughout the year and we don’t anticipate it changing or flattening off any time soon,” Tricia Pattee, director of product management at HealtheCareers Network, told Physicians Practice.
“This is due to the physician shortage, and we’re seeing a lot of the NPs and PAs backfilling where physicians haven’t been able to be filled and taking on a lot of those responsibilities. With the [outcome of] the election last night, we do anticipate the increased number of patients needing care to also affect this and to continue the increase in demand” for NPs and PAs.
Of course, as demand heats up, supply cools down. If your practice is considering hiring an NP or PA in the near future, prepare for some stiff competition.
“I think that as we saw the nursing shortage follow the physician shortage, we’ll see a similar trend with the [nonphysician] practitioners also be in more demand and have a shortage there,” said Pattee. “The good thing for nursing and [nonphysicians] backfilling physicians is that the education takes obviously a shorter period to complete, so it will be easier for us to recover in those shortage areas just because of the time to become qualified.”
There are other reasons beyond dealing with increased patient demand that practices may want to consider hiring PAs and/or NPs. A recent study in the Archives of Internal Medicine found that 38 percent of physicians have burnout symptoms, characterized as loss of enthusiasm for work, feelings of cynicism, and a low sense of personal accomplishment. Nonphysician providers can help address that problem, said Pattee.
“Training other people outside of their physicians to take on some responsibilities to prevent some of the burnout is a key component here,” she said. “... I think anything that revolves around training and getting more of a team environment in the facility is key so that responsibilities can be shared and we don’t see people leaving the field all together because they can’t handle the stress or the workload.”
What staffing changes do you think your practice will make due to the election outcome?
"Interesting prospective indeed!" a retired doctor of France having become a chronically impaired patient says…
In addition to the employee demand cited here, 2013 will see competitive recruiting for occupational therapists as well as physical therapists, speech-language pathologists, specialist nurses, certified nursing assistants and home health aides.
[Comment edited to remove promotional material.]
It may be cheaper and more practical for future providers not to go to any US medical school but just attend least expensive local community colleges, get the lowest cost bachelors degree and top it off with community college nursing degree. The more aspiring ones can go for doctorate in nursing and can be actually called doctors instead of provider. Some may get a MBA from a reputable school with internet courses and can take on important positions as Chief "anything you want" officers in hospitals. Due to the mandatory, onerous documentation requirement, click box filling work, there is a lot of scope for EMR scribes. Pay for providers will continue to fall to allow equitable distribution of scant dollars into a workforce that demands jobs. There will certainly be plenty of jobs because of attrition of physician workforce. Complex cases will be telemedicined and hopefully even teleported to a foreign country with formally trained physicians and surgeons.The future looks bright!