Hospitalist medicine is unpredictable. How do I know that? Because I've been doing this for over eight years and my starting daily census can often vary from eight to eighteen patients a day.
Over the years, I've come to accept the unpredictable nature of a hospitalist based medical practice. We are at the mercy of patient. If they are sick, we are here to help. We don't actively recruit our clientele. They're here so we care for them. We can either complain about it or minimize the effect and the number of the unpredictable times. I believe flexibility is key. While hospitalist medicine does offer the benefit of fixed schedules, having some flexibility can introduced a satisfying compromise during busy times.
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If Happy's hospital succeeds in getting patients into our front doors, Happy's hospitalist medicine service grows too. When the hospital wins, we win. Because we are hospitalists. We care for hospitalized patients. It's all about market share in our aging population. Economically speaking if they win, we win. If we win, they win. And don't forget the patient wins too with our excellent care.
And let me tell you, I see winning all around me the the incredible changes going. Slowly, but surely the
hospital culture is changing. And I see it changing for the good. By leaps and bounds. Years ago I would laugh at such a position. Not anymore.
Despite all the government noise and unfunded mandates we must deal with navigating the uncharted waters and economic suicide that is ObamaCare, the members of administration I have had the honor of working with are some of best medical and nonmedical minds in hospital based care. They get it. Period. It's my honor to move forward in all the initiatives playing out to make Happy's hospital the best regional medical center that patients and doctors and nurses will want to experience.
With that said, as hospitalists, we always seems to remember the really busy days. We tend to forget the slow ones. Happy's hospitalist service has finally hit the summer slow down. And it just happens to be the first day of fall. That's the unpredictable nature of hospitalist medicine. I can say, without a doubt, we have become busier as a hospitalist group. Our daily beginning census is growing. This year, compared with last, we are seeing more patients. We are seeing sicker patients. We are seeing more complicated patients.
What is an appropriate starting daily census and appropriate total number of encounters per day for a hospitalist group? The generally accept point of peak efficiency occurs in the 15-17 total daily encounters per day. Of course, I believe, that number is widely variable based on the technology platform we are given to work with. The fewer steps I make in a day, the less often I log into a computer, the more often daily patient data is presented to me in an always on fashion with immediate access to my wide range of data (including lab, x ray and nursing information), the more patients I can see in a day.
Does that mean I could see 25, 30, 35 patients in a day? Possibly. In the future. Not now. No way. Not even close. But, give me the tools to manage my daily census and unpredictable will become irrelevant. And I'll remember everyday like I only had eight patients.
And that's WIN-WIN for everyone.
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