Facilities that are looking for a way to achieve a closer bond between hospital-based practitioners and their peers who work at satellite clinics should work with medical staff leaders to extend medical staff membership and hospital privileges to clinic practitioners.
Although medical staff membership is separate from clinical privileges, linking the two together can result in a medical staff with greater dedication to the organization. Just granting privileges alone will get the practitioners in the door, but what happens after that?
"I don't like the idea of providing access to your hospital without requiring [practitioners] also take on responsibilities that go along with medical staff membership," says Kathy Matzka, CPMSM, CPCS, a medical staff consultant from Lebanon, IL. "I don't think we should let them off the hook and give them a free pass. They need to be integrated into hospital organization."
Therefore, the benefits of hospital privileges, such as increased revenue from seeing more patients, should come with the responsibilities of medical staff membership, such as meeting attendance, according to Matzka.
Extending medical staff membership to practitioners who primarily work at satellite clinic locations is one way to ensure that those practitioners work as a unit with their hospital-based peers. But it's not the only way.
Here are three other tips hospitals can use to build camaraderie between the two groups. Remember that building relationships today can pave the way for smooth working conditions in the future.
- Make medical staff meeting attendance mandatory, at least for some meetings. This guarantees that practitioners from multiple locations will gather in a central place to discuss issues that will affect all of them.
- Hold social events or departmental meetings at clinic locations. Some clinics may not have appropriate meeting space, but if they do, explore this option. It will help convince satellite practitioners, who typically travel to the hospital for meetings, to attend, and it will give hospital-based practitioners a clearer picture of the off-site facilities.
- Include news updates from the clinic in monthly hospital newsletters. Additionally, if the newsletter features a practitioner of the month or highlights the cutting-edge work of a particular team, include a photo along with the article. This will help the hospital-based practitioners get to know the satellite practitioners better.
Emily Berry is an associate editor for Briefings on Credentialing and Credentialing Resource Center Connection, and manages CredentialingResourceCenter.com. You can reach her at eberry@hcpro.com.