Fixing Physician Burnout

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I wanted to just use three words: Direct Primary Care and then do a mic drop but I couldn’t help laughing at the AAFP’s Family Practice Management editor’s view on the subject.  Here are his thoughts:

What are some of the causes of burnout? Payment, documentation, and regulatory requirements; inefficient technology and workflows; excessive and often inappropriate administrative paperwork; and lack of control.

What are some potential solutions?

  • Payment mechanisms that reward physicians for doing things more efficiently, including payments for e-messaging, phone calls, and telemedicine.
  • Standardizing quality metrics, formularies, and prior authorization rules.
  • Government payment initiatives that don’t constantly threaten physicians’ financial security.
  • Government regulations that give physicians more, not less, say in the health systems in which they work.
  • To date, physician-led accountable care organizations have been more successful than hospital-based ones.
  • Incentives that promote better electronic health record usability.
  • Better teamwork, delegation, and workflows.
  • Tort reform.
  • Simplification of documentation requirements.

If you were a reader of this blog over the past 14 years then you would know that the AAFP was a major part of the causes listed! They were complicit in NOT defending us against this bureaucratic nightmare. And his solutions?  Efficiency, metrics, ACOs, EHR usability incentives, teamwork, etc.  Sounds like more of the same.  Good luck in fixing that burnout thing.  Or you can recommend……

DIRECT PRIMARY CARE.

Problem solved.

Mic drop.