基于病种临床路径的门急诊绩效考核机制探索

为改变以工作量为导向的传统门急诊绩效分配模式,通过建立并试行门急诊优势病种电子化临床路径,结合“多劳多得、优绩优酬”的考核新思维,建立了以临床专业能力评价、医师工作量贡献、医师劳务贡献及分配方式改变等为核心的多维度门急诊绩效考核新机制。实践以来,30个优势病种的门急诊量与同期相比增加8.9%,临床路径入组率达89.2%,完成率达91.5%,患者满意度从92.1%提升至97.2%,90%以上的医务人员收入明显增加。绩效引导下的门急诊病种临床路径管理方法可充分调动医务人员工作积极性,有效提高医师工作效率和临床服务能力,进而改善患者就医体验,提升门急诊服务质量与水平     

Minnesota general surgeons. Where do they come from?

A downward trend in the number of graduates from U.S. allopathic medical schools applying for general surgery residency positions has raised questions about whether there will be sufficient numbers of general surgeons to meet future needs. Of particular concern are rural areas, which some studies have suggested will increasingly feel the effects of physician shortages because of the aging physician work force, increasing overall population, and aging patient population. Where physicians are educated and trained appears to have a significant effect on where they choose to practice. This article reports on a 2004 study of where practicing general surgeons in Minnesota went to medical school and did their residencies. According to the findings, the majority received their medical school and/or residency training in the Upper Midwest, and many have come from Minnesota's own medical schools and general surgery residency programs.     

Nonemergency medicine-trained physician coverage in rural emergency departments.

CONTEXT: Rural areas have fewer physicians compared to urban areas, and rural emergency departments often rely on community or contracted providers for staffing. The emergency department workforce is composed of a variety of physician specialties and clinicians. PURPOSE: To determine the distribution of emergency department clinicians and the proportion of care they provide across the rural-urban continuum. METHODS: Cross-sectional analysis of secondary data. The distribution of clinicians who provide emergency department care by county was determined using the 2003 Area Resource File. The percentage of emergency department care provided by clinician type was determined using 2003 Medicare claims data. Logistic regression analyses assessed the odds of being seen by different clinicians with a patient's rurality when presenting to the emergency department. FINDINGS: Board-certified emergency physicians provide 75% of all emergency department care, but only 48% for Medicare beneficiaries of the most rural of counties. The bulk of the remainder of emergency department care is largely provided by family physicians and general internists, with the percentage increasing with rurality. The likelihood of being seen by an emergency physician in the emergency department decreases 5-fold as rurality increases, while being seen by a family physician increases 7-fold. CONCLUSION: Nonemergency physicians provide a significant portion of emergency department care, particularly in rural areas. Medical specialties must cooperate to ensure the availability of high-quality emergency department care to all Americans regardless of physician specialty.     

Exploring dual commitment among physician executives in managed care

The growth of a medical management specialty is a significant event associated with managed care. Physician executives are lauded for their potential in bridging the clinical and managerial realms. They also serve as a countervailing force to help the medical profession and patients maintain a strong voice in healthcare decision making at the strategic level. However, little is known about their work loyalties. These attitudes are important to explore because they speak to whose interests physician executives consider and represent in their everyday management roles. If physician executives are to maximize their effectiveness in the healthcare workplace, both physicians and organizations must view them as credible sources of authority. This study examines organizational and professional commitment among a national sample of physician executives employed in managed care settings. Data used for the analysis come from a national survey conducted through the American College of Physician Executives in 1996. The findings support the notion that physician executives can and do express simultaneous loyalty to organizational and professional interests. This dual commitment is related to other work attitudes that contribute to success in the management role. In addition, it appears that situational factors increase the chances for dual commitment. These factors derive from a favorable work environment that includes both organizational and professional socialization in the management role. The results of the study are useful in specifying the training and socialization needs of physicians who wish to do management work. They also provide a rationale for collaboration between healthcare organizations and rank-and-file physicians aimed at cultivating physician executives who are credible leaders within the healthcare system.     

Increasing surgeon productivity: the effect of the addition of musculoskeletal physicians to an orthopedic surgery department

The orthopedic surgery department at Mayo Clinic, Jacksonville, Florida, sought to improve the productivity of individual surgeons while maintaining quality of patient care as well as patient and physician satisfaction by expanding the department to include dedicated nonoperative musculoskeletal physicians who would evaluate patients and refer those requiring surgical care to surgeons within the department. With the addition of two such physicians, the yield of surgical patients by orthopedic surgeons increased by 20%, and the direct margin of the department increased by 19%. Moreover, referring physicians and patients were very satisfied with the care provided by the musculoskeletal physicians.     

Fewer hospitalizations result when primary care is highly integrated into a continuing care retirement community

Meeting the medical and social needs of elderly people is likely to be costly, disruptive, and at odds with personal preferences if efforts to do so are not well coordinated. We compared two different models of primary care in four different continuing care retirement communities. In the first model, used in one community, the physicians and two part-time nurse practitioners delivered clinical care only at that site, covered all settings within it, and provided all after-hours coverage. In the second model, used in three communities, on-site primary care physician hours were limited; the same physicians also had independent practices outside the retirement community; and after-hours calls were covered by all members of the practices, including physicians who did not practice on site. We found that residents in the first model had two to three times fewer hospitalizations and emergency department visits. Only 5 percent of those who died did so in a hospital, compared to 15 percent at the other sites and 27 percent nationally. These findings provide insight into what is possible when medical care is highly integrated into a residential retirement setting.     

Hospital-physicians relations: cooperation, competition, or separation?

Because many services performed in hospitals can safely and conveniently be performed in ambulatory settings, physicians have become owners of entities directly competing with hospitals for patients in a new medical arms race. Hospitals and medical staff physicians face growing tensions as a result of physicians' growing reluctance to take emergency department call and the consequences of hospitalists replacing physicians in the care of inpatients. Although there are increasing expectations that health system challenges will lead hospitals and physicians to collaborate, in many markets the willingness and ability for hospitals and physicians to work together is actually eroding.     

Physician services in an academic neurology department: using the resource-based relative-value scale to examine physician activities.

The inability of physician managers and decision makers to critically analyze the resource utilization of physicians has hindered a more comprehensive understanding of the role of neurologists in the patterns and organization of medical practice. This article outlines an approach for using the physician work relative value units (RVUs) in the Medicare Fee Schedule (MFS) to address this problem and profile physician clinical activities in a comparative manner. These techniques are then used to profile the physician services associated with the neurology department at a large academic hospital. All 28,048 physician services associated with a neurology department in 1995 were studied. Using billing data, physician work RVUs were assigned to each service and the results analyzed by major services, type of service, and physician workload for physician work RVUs and physician charges. For the average service, mean physician charges were $187 per service while median physician charges were $120. Mean physician work RVUs per service averaged 1.3 RVUs, and the median was 0.94 per service. Of all the services provided in the neurology department, 65 percent are visits and consultations, while medicine services (e.g., nerve conduction studies, needle electromyography, neuropsychological testing, and electroencephalogram) make up 31 percent. All the other services combined represented less than five percent of the services in the department. The top five physicians in the department account for 33 percent of all physician work RVUs in the neurology department. Using the physician work relative values in the MFS provides a unique perspective for analyzing and understanding neurologists' work activities.     

Primary care and public emergency department overcrowding.

OBJECTIVES. Our objective was to evaluate whether referral to primary care settings would be clinically appropriate for and acceptable to patients waiting for emergency department care for nonemergency conditions. METHODS. We studied 700 patients waiting for emergency department care at a public hospital. Access to alternative sources of medical care, clinical appropriateness of emergency department use, and patients' willingness to use nonemergency services were measured and compared between patients with and without a regular source of care. RESULTS. Nearly half (45%) of the patients cited access barriers to primary care as their reason for using the emergency department. Only 13% of the patients waiting for care had conditions that were clinically appropriate for emergency department services. Patients with a regular source of care used the emergency department more appropriately than did patients without a regular source of care. Thirty-eight percent of the patients expressed a willingness to trade their emergency department visit for an appointment with a physician within 3 days. CONCLUSIONS. Public emergency departments could refer large numbers of patients to appointments at primary care facilities. This alternative would be viable only if the availability and coordination of primary care services were enhanced for low-income populations.     

Care management cuts ED use for pain

A pain care management program at Kootenai Medical Center has resulted in a 77% decrease in emergency department visits by patients whose primary complaint was pain. Case managers are alerted when patients with a history of repetitive visits present to the emergency department. They work with the emergency department physicians on a treatment plan and help them identify a primary care physician and make an appointment for follow-up care. Patients receive non-narcotic pain relief whenever possible and may be referred to a physical therapist if appropriate.     

Family physicians in university hospital intensive care units

Although physicians in most family practice residency programs hospitalize their patients at community hospitals, those in 21 programs in the United States hospitalize patients exclusively at university hospitals. Through a questionnaire mailed to directors of each of these programs, it was learned that family practice residency faculty have medical intensive care (ICU) privileges at 38 percent of these university hospitals. No family physicians had ever been denied ICU privileges at any of these hospitals. Mandatory consultations were reported by only a minority of programs. At 62 percent of these university hospitals, family physicians do not have ICU privileges. However, no family physician had every made a formal application for them. Intensive care patients at these hospitals were generally cared for by specialists and house staff in internal medicine or critical care.     

Reimbursement challenges for emergency physicians

Emergency physicians are under growing fiscal pressures on multiple fronts. Federal and state laws require that emergency care be provided to all those presenting at an emergency department, yet in nearly all cases there is no comparable mandate for reimbursement. The growing number of uninsured and underinsured, as well as downward pressure on reimbursement from managed care organizations and social assistance programs such as Medicaid and Medicare, also contributes to the difficulty of emergency physicians to be compensated. It may be time for the public to address more fundamental questions about the right to care and who pays for that care.     

Implications of reassigning patients for the medical home: a case study

PURPOSE Improving patient-doctor continuity is one goal of the medical home, but achieving this goal may require physicians to reduce panel size. This article examines the impact on patient experience and utilization of Group Health Cooperative’s process of reassigning patients to new physicians as part of their medical home demonstration project.METHODS This work represents a subanalysis of the Group Health medical home pilot evaluation. Study participants include 8,005 adults who received primary care in 2006 and 2007 at an urban practice owned and operated by a not-for-profit integrated delivery system. Approximately one-quarter of patients were selected to be reassigned to a new physician. Primary care, emergency department, secure messaging, and telephone utilization were captured through automated sources. Patients’ experience was measured before and after implementation of the medical home for a subset of 1,098 patients.RESULTS Patients who were retained by their existing physicians were older, sicker, and had longer preexisting patient-doctor relationships. After reassignment, reassigned patients were less likely to use primary care services but equally likely to use the emergency department. They were no less satisfied with their care experience.CONCLUSIONS Informational and managerial continuity may mitigate deleterious effects of reassignment, but more must be done to actively bind reassigned patients to the medical home to improve relational continuity with younger, healthier patients.     

Defining Competencies and Performance Indicators for Physicians in Medical Management

The recent and profound changes in the American health care delivery system have created a need for physicians who are trained and willing to assume a high level of responsibility for managing evolving health care organizations. Yet most physicians receive no formal training in medical administration and management because changes in medical school and residency education have lagged behind changes in clinical practice and reimbursement. To avoid haphazard approaches and unnecessary duplication of resources, it is important for physicians involved in managerial medicine to collectively identify competencies in this area needed in the marketplace. The American College of Preventive Medicine (ACPM), with funding from the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), undertook an effort to identify competencies essential for physicians who will fill leadership roles in medical management. Like ACPM’s earlier effort to develop core competencies in preventive medicine, this project drew upon the theoretical model of competency-based education. This article describes the strategy we followed in reaching consensus among a diverse group of physician executives and preventive medicine residency program directors, and includes the list of medical management competencies and performance indicators developed. Recurrent issues that can sidetrack competency development projects are also presented as well as suggestions for overcoming them. The competencies can serve as a framework for expanding current core preventive medicine training in management and administration and for developing new training programs to equip physicians with the special expertise they will need to provide management leadership within the changing landscape of health care delivery.     

Implications of Good Samaritan laws for physicians

Good Samaritan laws are designed to encourage individuals, including physicians, to gratuitously render medical care in emergency situations. Through these laws, immunity from civil liability is provided to physicians who act in good faith to provide emergency care gratis. Historically, emergency care involved medical assistance given to persons in motor vehicle crashes or other emergency situations in which bystanders were present. Protection of physicians from allegations of negligence was a tactic of the legislative and judicial systems to encourage active clinical participation, rather than cautious nonparticipation, in emergency care. In some states and under defined circumstances, the immunity may apply in the hospital setting, as well as in the physician's office. Legislatures have continued to amend the statutes to expand the protection provided to physicians who offer emergency care. Judicial construction of the nature and scope of physician immunity has similarly expanded.     

Strikes by physicians: a historical perspective toward an ethical evaluation.

Current conditions surrounding the house of medicine-including corporate and government cost-containment strategies, increasing market-penetration schemes in health care, along with clinical scrutiny and the administrative control imposed under privatization by managed care firms, insurance companies, and governments-have spurred an upsurge in physician unionization, which requires a revisiting of the issue of physician strikes. Strikes by physicians have been relatively rare events in medical history. When they have occurred, they have aroused intense debate over their ethical justification among professionals and the public alike, notwithstanding what caused the strikes. As physicians and other health care providers increasingly find employment within organizations as wage-contract employees and their work becomes more highly rationalized, more physicians will join labor organizations to protect both their economic and their professional interests. As a result, these physicians will have to come to terms with the use of the strike weapon. On the surface, many health care strikes may not ever seem justifiable, but in certain defined situations a strike would be not only permissible but an ethical imperative. With an exacerbation of labor strife in the health sector in many nations, it is crucial to explore the question of what constitutes an ethical physician strike.     

The alignment and blending of payment incentives within physician organizations

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the blend of retrospective (fee-for-service, productivity-based salary) and prospective (capitation, nonproductivity-based salary) methods for compensating individual physicians within medical groups and independent practice associations (IPAs) and the influence of managed care on the compensation blend used by these physician organizations. DATA SOURCES: Of the 1,587 medical groups and IPAs with 20 or more physicians in the United States, 1,104 responded to a one-hour telephone survey, with 627 providing detailed information on physician payment methods. STUDY DESIGN: We calculated the distribution of compensation methods for primary care and specialty physicians, separately, in both medical groups and IPAs. Multivariate regression methods were used to analyze the influence of market and organizational factors on the payment method developed by physician organizations for individual physicians. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Within physician organizations, approximately one-quarter of physicians are paid on a purely retrospective (fee-for-service) basis, approximately one-quarter are paid on a purely prospective (capitation, nonproductivity-based salary) basis, and approximately one-half on blends of retrospective and prospective methods. Medical groups and IPAs in heavily penetrated managed care markets are significantly less likely to pay their individual physicians based on fee-for-service than are organizations in less heavily penetrated markets. CONCLUSIONS: Physician organizations rely on a wide range of prospective, retrospective, and blended payment methods and seek to align the incentives faced by individual physicians with the market incentives faced by the physician organization.     

Physician executives in managed care: characteristics and job involvement across two career stages.

This paper examines characteristics, job involvement, and career stage differences among 294 physician executives working in managed care settings. The following research questions guide the study: What types of physicians are currently in managerial roles in these settings? What role (if any) does medical career stage play in physician executives' professional and job-related attitudes? What factors are related to physician executives' involvement in their management roles? Several observations are made from the findings. First, contemporary physician executives see management as an exciting alternative career that involves multiple work loyalties, weaker beliefs in traditional professional values, and the sacrifice of significant amounts of clinical for management work. Second, these trends are more pronounced for physician executives at earlier points in their medical careers, although their work loyalties to profession and employing organization are weaker than older physician executives' loyalties. Younger individuals' involvement in management work, more than older individuals' involvement, appears to depend upon the surrounding work climate within the organization. Finally, the amount of time spent by physician executives as clinicians is inversely related to how psychologically attached they are to management, regardless of career stage.     

HMO physicians' use of referrals

Clinical uncertainty is a source of variation in medical decision-making as well as a source of work-related stress. Increasing enrollment in organized health care systems has intensified interest in understanding referral utilization as well as issues such as physician dissatisfaction and burnout. We examined whether primary care physicians' affective reactions to uncertainty and their job characteristics were associated with use of referrals and burnout. Data came from mail surveys of primary care physicians practicing in two large group model health maintenance organizations (HMOs) in the USA. Consistent with past research, we found that younger physicians had higher referral rates than older physicians, and that general internists had higher rates than either family practitioners or pediatricians. Greater stress from uncertainty increased referrals and referrals were negatively correlated with heavier work demands (patient visits per hour). Greater stress from uncertainty, perceived workload (too high) and a sense of loss of control over the practice environment were associated with higher levels of burnout.