Community Chat

[Nomorebirthdays]

@Noel7. I never heard of it either, but I think it's a good idea. Did he assist your entire hospital stay?

[Bri36]

@SahmIam, it is an interesting thread.   

There is a hospitalist in the hospital 24 hours a day.   If the nurses have a question or if a patient needs to speak to a doctor, the hospitalist is available.   There is no need to "page" the doctor or worry about getting ahold of someone in the middle of the night.   There is a higher quality of care, IMO.  

[151949]

In my DH's case it was great - his attending physician was in the OR so they called the hospitalist - he was there in a few min, and within a few more my DH had a very needed IV. His BS was only 53. He could not have waited for his doctor to finish in the OR.

I assume hospitals with interns and residents don'tr need this. They can call the intern.

[feline groovy]

Anything in the pet care -related field has been growing every year for the last 5-10.

[Lucky Charm]

So is the hospitalist what I would call the 'on call' doctor when you are admitted?  Not your doctor or anyone in his practice, but a doctor who's already at the hospital..

[151949]

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@Lucky Charm wrote:

So is the hospitalist what I would call the 'on call' doctor when you are admitted?  Not your doctor or anyone in his practice, but a doctor who's already at the hospital..

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Not in all cases , but in many cases now a days, you never see your PCP once you are oin the hospital, and instead your cared for by hospital staff.When my DH had his stroke he only had the neuro doc & the hospitalist.

[Lucky Charm]

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@151949 wrote:

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@Lucky Charm wrote:

So is the hospitalist what I would call the 'on call' doctor when you are admitted?  Not your doctor or anyone in his practice, but a doctor who's already at the hospital..

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Not in all cases , but in many cases now a days, you never see your PCP once you are oin the hospital, and instead your cared for by hospital staff.When my DH had his stroke he only had the neuro doc & the hospitalist.

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Yeah our pcp is paring down his practice from 6000 patients to 600.  (He was in with another dr and one or two nurse practioners.)

He will pick and choose who he will take on as patients and to the tune of $1650 a year--on top of healthcare coverage costs.

The practice had soliticed the *boutique* deal years ago and one of the *amenities* was in hospital visitation.

I guess they didn't get many takers....

[chrystaltree]

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@SahmIam wrote:

@chrystaltree  I may be confusing the jobs of two different groups OR those names aren't used in the hospitals I've been to.

I was in hospital last month for 3 weeks; the person who handled my in-house care was the doctor assigned to the floor and she didn't call her herself a hosptialist. She also wasn't in charge during week 2 or week 3; a different doctor was each week. Honestly, the nurses knew more than the doctors when it came to everything. 

That said, there was a woman who met me via the ER, handled everything there, handled my transfer to Observation, informed me of what was being done, the results and then the transfer to my room for the next few weeks. She would pop in and see how things were, any questions/concerns and follow up. She wasn't a doctor and I THOUGHT she said she was a hospitalist but thinking back, it must have a different term with the word "hospital-something" on her ID badge/card..

In any event, no complaints but I wonder if the job differs in different parts of the country. Saw the same thing when my son was in hospital (different state, however).

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      Most hospitals don't use hospitalists, neither the hospital I work in nor the one my husband use's them.  The general public would not even know the term and I suspect that since they are doctors or nurse prationers in some cases, that's how they identify themselves.  They wouldn't say "I'm a hospitalist".  The person who handled your case was probably an ER physician.  She was your admitting physcian and she managed your care.  Since you were admitted to obsersvation, you were an outpatient or ED patient.  Not that any of that ever matters to a patient, it only matters to the hospital and to the insurers.