re: Defeat the Nurse Practitioner scope of practice expansion - Louisiana SB 187

You are brainwashed if you believe an optometrist understands pathology and drugs better than a medical doctor. Kool aid done got you high buddy

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Go research this yourself. Don't believe what they are telling you. You are 100% wrong on this.

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Ok here you go
Here is another

Ophthalmology is a very small and in-demand specialty.

FYI. Something I received in my doctoral training is how to be a highly effective researcher.

So I'll use that as a jumping off point for my qualm with physicians that push new diets and treatments and make other know-it-all type claims. You see plenty of physicians on TV that have written books on "new medical science" for something that is nothing more than a fad diet. Having the title of doctor does not make a PhD a physician just the same as having an MD does not make one a researcher. Medical doctors do not receive the same level of training in biostatistical analysis, experimental design, and are not required to gain expertise in a specific area that exceeds the knowledge of their committee and peers prior to graduation. I'm glad that some state medical boards have cracked down on physicians like Dr. Oz, but that really seems to be more of an exception rather than a rule.

Long story short is that professionals are constantly looking for new ways to use what training they do have, and apply that to other areas that are related. Just as you find it scary for someone without an MD practicing higher levels of medicine, I find it scary that people without PhD's are making claims about treatments that often turn out to be nothing more than a myopic fad. Sure, you see some initial improvement in a clinical setting, but what happens years down the line? A lot of medical doctors appear to be circumventing various FDA processes and making assumptions about things that they do not fully understand the mechanism of action.

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How does reducing oversight increase supply?

Simple question

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Two things:

The supply of supervising physicians is finite. Having mid-level supply with no supervision does us no good (assuming no SB187). And right now there are far more graduating NP's and PA's than PCP's. How many mid levels do you thing an MD can supervise effectively? Supervison, currently, means signing off on the chart in most cases. How many charts a day should a supervising MD read? And what if geography allows only remote access? Can a physician in Houston "supervise" a rural mid level? We don't have enough physicians for you to have some degree of (indirect) contact with every patient in the country. And I don't understand why you would want to. You're stretched thin enough as it is.

The more obvious answer is that without a requirement for oversight, mid levels can more choose how/where/what they want to practice, instead of being restricted by job vacancies that are dependent on a physician's desire to supervise and manage a NP/PA.

Now, graduating PA's get jobs when physicians or health systems have openings. Reducing oversight provides more opportunity for practice.

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Womski

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We're gonna get you a witch doctor for your health needs. You've bitched about all the other providers, and I've heard they have some really great natural pain killers and anesthetics. Give it a shot. I bet they are cheap.

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Greedy bastards.

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Only attorneys are worse. Amirite?

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money out of doctors' pockets, I'm down for. Greedy bastards

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It's about time you stated your real intentions

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That is a tremendous amount for the population size.

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What are your options in rural areas? I suspect there are plenty of underserved communities.

Louisiana's problem in general is that it only has a handful of big cities, but those big cities really aren't very large.

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Are you sure about that

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I pulled up a list of articles and chose to only link the first couple. Admittedly I quickly linked ones on the criteria that they were meeting my confirmation bias and not thoroughly vetting them. They still made points that supported my argument. Alas, like Donald Trump I don't really care about cold hard facts here, I'm just trying to rile your emotions.

Look, I respect your opinion. While I am a scientist, I am not in the medical field. However, I have close family and friends that are who have spoken very candidly about this. I do think that there are legitimate concerns about the quality of care, but there is also an obvious power struggle.

If docs would be more available and less of a racket, people wouldn't have to see a NP.

Ok but the non ophthalmology medical doctors are not really treating the eye. You've got a straw man argument there. Compare the ophthalmologist and the optometrist

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All this thread is showing is that the general populace has no clue what drives physician compensation. All they see is hurried doctors and expensive bills and think, "Well, golly gee whiz. It must be that rich greedy doctor's fault."

Doctors would love to get paid for their bedside manner and diagnostic prowess, but they don't. In the majority of cases they get payed a flat rate that keeps going down, and thus they must see more patients to make up for it. And to make matters worse, as medicine starts to become free patients start to become entitled and whiny. They demand to see every specialist and have every test run because it doesn't affect their wallets.

Claiming the answer to the above is to cut into doctors' businesses further and give power to the underqualified is not addressing the real problems at hand.