Want to eliminate the PCP shortages

Nurses represent the largest category of caregivers in primary care with 250,000 graduates annually but fallout rates are half after only two years. Wow and wow. Undervalued they say. And only 2% of articles mention nursing in healthcare press. So invisible, too. In most states NPs have restrictions to their scope of practice. Why ? Docs say they lack the 10,000 hours of training Malcolm Gladwell counts to become the Beatles or Steve Jobs. Residencies are 12-15,000 hours so there you go, Docs.

So why can’t nurses provide a wider scope after 10,000 hours in practice ? They are after all, a Doctor of Nurse Practitioner, today. Well it’s economic. Long as docs can bill these providers higher than they cost it’s too profitable to let them fly.

I learned last week Chief Nursing Officers are a lovely title with little budget authority and the true path to make a difference almost always involves an MBA not DNP alone. So a VP of Nursing with a budget trumps a pretty title.

Not the case for MDs. They don’t need that MBA to advance.

Here’s nursing beef I disagree with —

Training is not federally subsidized (which should be yanked from silly MD residency slotting since $60k residents we pay for are billed out at $2.4m on average )