Hospital Emergency On-Call Coverage: Is There a Doctor in the House?
Source: Center for Studying Health System Change
From press release:

As emergency departments face ever-rising demands, hospitals are confronting greater problems obtaining emergency on-call coverage from specialist physicians, according to study released today by the Center for Studying Health System Change’s (HSC).

Factors influencing physician reluctance to provide on-call coverage include decreased dependence on hospital admitting privileges as more services shift to non-hospital settings; payment for emergency care, especially for uninsured patients; and medical liability concerns, according to the study. Hospital strategies to secure on-call coverage include enforcing hospital medical staff bylaws that require physicians to take call, contracting with physicians to provide coverage, paying physicians daily or monthly stipends, and employing specialists.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 21st, 2007 at 10:46 am and is filed under Consumer issues, Health and healthcare. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.