A Hospitalist, or Hospital Medicine Clinician, is a type of general physician who is responsible for providing care to patients during their stay at a hospital. Their duties include managing schedules for inpatient treatments and coordinating care providers, ordering tests and maintaining medical records for their patients.
A Hospitalist should be able to fulfill various duties and responsibilities. The following are some duties and responsibilities a Hospitalist should be able to execute:
- Focusing primarily on hospitalized patients, the Hospitalist has the unique ability to follow up on patient care, discuss patient care with nurses and resolve any problems that may arise, often seeing patients more than once a day. While attending their own patients, the Hospitalist will also coordinate care between different doctors caring for a patient, serve as point of contact for hospital staff and maintain communication with the patient’s family.
A competitive Hospitalist will have certain skills and qualifications, including:
- Ability to multitask: Since a Hospitalist is located at the hospital, they should be able to handle multiple responsibilities concurrently. If they are overseeing a patient and have important committee meetings, they should be able to order the appropriate tests and focus on the meeting at the same time.
- Prioritization: The Hospitalist is a leadership role as well as a physician. The ability to evaluate what must be done and rearranging the day according to importance will enable the Hospitalist to be successful in this role.
- Professionalism: As a liaison between hospital administration and physicians as well as a practicing physician, a professional demeanor is necessary as a Hospitalist. Conveying news to a patient’s family that could be detrimental must be handled in the most professional manner.
- Superb communication skills: Relaying policy and structural changes to physicians already carrying a heavy workload must be handled with the appropriate amount of appreciation and authority. The Hospitalist must also be able to communicate via email, memos and staff notices.
