Next month I will look at special circumstances, and some pros and cons of having an individual hospitalist take on the care of more patients at the beginning of consecutive day shifts, and exempting them from taking on new patients on the last day or two before rotating off. TH
Dr. Nelson has been a practicing hospitalist since 1988 and is co-founder and past president of SHM. He is a principal in Nelson Flores Hospital Medicine Consultants, a national hospitalist practice management consulting firm (www.nelsonflores.com). He is also course co-director and faculty for SHM’s “Best Practices in Managing a Hospital Medicine Program” course. This column represents his views and is not intended to reflect an official position of SHM.