Medical Staff

Featured blog post: Pairing nurse directors with medical directors

Hospitalist Leadership Connection, August 17, 2010

In the September issue of Medical Staff Briefing, I spoke with Thomas Huth, MD, vice president of medical affairs at Reid Hospital and Health Care Services in Richmond, IN. Reid’s hospitalist program has implemented a nurse director role and, as a result, it has seen significant financial and operational improvements. The nurse director works closely with the medical director, serving as an extra pair of arms and legs to help the physician accomplish the many tasks that might be pushed by the wayside due to lack of time. For example, the nurse director might arrange for a patient to be transferred to a skilled nursing facility where the cost of providing care is less expensive, rather than having the patient stay in the hospital one more night while at-home care is being arranged.

Huth provided a chart that compares the medical directors’ and nurse director’s roles. If your hospitalist program chooses to enlist the services of a nurse director, keep this chart handy to give you a sense of the medical director-nurse director relationship.

You can download the medical director and nurse manager descriptions of roles from www.MedicalStaffLeader.com.

Most Popular

Related Articles