Medical Staff

Hospitalists not cause for declining generalists

Hospitalist Leadership Connection, April 6, 2010

Despite arguments that the hospitalist movement has crowded out generalists, hospital utilization of generalists was declining even before the emergence of hospitalists, according to a new article, “U.S. trends in hospitalization and generalist physician workforce and the emergence of hospitalists,” published in the March online issue of Journal of General Internal Medicine.

Researchers at the University of Chicago studied inpatient data between 1980-2005 from the National Hospital Discharge Survey and physician data from the American Medical Association. They found that generalists who have traditionally cared for patients in the ambulatory and hospitalization settings moved towards caring for high-risk patients during that time.

“It is also possible that declining hospital utilization relative to the size of the generalist workforce reduced the incentives for generalists to continue providing hospital care,” states the article.
 

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