The American Association of Nurse Anesthetists Decides to Confuse Patients More by Becoming the American Association of Nurse Anesthesiology
We just saw this fun article: AANA Announces Major Rebrand and Moves Forward as the American Association of Nurse Anesthesiology. Isn’t that interesting? Does anyone know why they are doing this?
Marking a historic moment in its 90-year history, the professional association representing the nation’s nearly 60,000 Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetists (CRNAs) and Student Registered Nurse Anesthetists (SRNAs) debuted its new name today. Moving forward as the American Association of Nurse Anesthesiology (AANA), the name change is part of a yearlong rebranding effort designed to advance the science of nurse anesthesiology and advocate for CRNAs—one of the U.S. healthcare system’s highly sought-after anesthesia care providers.
We’ll answer for you. They are doing this to confuse patients. They will have soon have their nurses be called doctors next, by doing an online diploma mill doctorate, and then the magic trick is complete.
“With years of education and critical care experience, CRNAs bring the best in overall patient experience,” he (President Sertich) said.
Do you see how they are trying to conflate education and experience to that of doctors?
Also, CRNAs bring the “best” in overall patient experience? Where’s the data on that? And if that isn’t a call to arms that they want to compete with doctors then I don’t know what is.
Remember when we used to work with midlevels as someone you supervised? Remember then they wanted to be part of a physician-led team? Remember when they wanted to run the team? Now they want independence to compete with doctors. And the patients don’t know because they aren’t told. And the patients are left unprotected.
On a side note, there has been precedent in NH that they CANNOT do this:
A recent New Hampshire Supreme Court decision upheld a New Hampshire Board of Medicine (NHBOM) ruling that prevents people from identifying themselves as anesthesiologists if they are not licensed as such.
The NHBOM voted to take that stance after the state’s nursing board approved a position statement in 2019 that let certified registered nurse anesthetists (CRNAs) call themselves “nurse anesthesiologists.” The New Hampshire Association of Nurse Anesthetists asked New Hampshire’s highest court to throw out NHBOM’s ruling.
The New Hampshire Supreme Court ruling is a win for the Litigation Center of the American Medical Association and State Medical Societies and the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA), which filed a joint amicus brief urging the court to uphold the NHBOM ruling.
Get your popcorn ready because this is going to be fun.
Great point Dr. Pearce. When I bought a new dish washer after my wife died, I dealt with the local appliance store of whom I treated many of their family members. Yeah their prices were a little bit higher but if I had ordered one from outside the area it was a wash.
The most experienced installer showed up of whom I had medically treated in the past with an assistant and cut out the old dish washer with a sawz-all. Didn’t damage the tile floor and got the new one in without leaks in the plumbing.
I am retired and ragged my then ex-patient, dish washer installer constantly about quitting smoking when he saw me when I was practicing and hit on him to quit when I was retired and he was installing my new dishwasher. (His dad had a heart transplant.)
The point is I got the “A-team” to install the dishwasher and as long as one has an “A-team” to do anesthesia, they’ll be in a good state.
BTW, my wife resorted to hand washing dishes as she didn’t want her “precious” tile floor to be dinged up. Turned out that when the dish washer installer had previously done some stove maintenance when my wife was alive, he told us he could get one in the space where the old non-functioning one was. It’s sad as my wife had to unexpectedly die before I could get a new dish washer.
She wouldn’t allow an attempt to get a new one in while she was alive and as said, the tile floor was left intact without a scratch!
Wished anesthesia was so simple.
Bottom line is the surgeon is responsible for the nurse anesthetist. If they efff up, the surgeon is the one that gets dinged in the malpractice suit. M.D. anesthesiologists carry their own malpractice for any alleged anesthesia related malfeasance.
I remember surgeons commenting upon that issue. Suffice it to say a long time trained nurse anesthetist can be very qualified and safe. In some institutions, a board certified M.D. anesthesiologist has to standby during induction. That was the case during my robotic prostatectomy. The N.A. introduced himself as such and mentioned that the M.D. anesthesiologist would be standing by during my induction. It didn’t bother me in the least bit as it was a major medical center I trained at and knew full well expertise was nearby. Plus I was in great physical shape. I had no problem with anesthesia and had a great outcome. 4.5 years prostate cancer free but I had to have post-op radiation and lupron therapy as the little lesion was peripheral and a tiny bit leaked out of the gland locally. Thank God for the choline PET scan that gave the coordinates to hit that bastid tumor with radiation therapy. So I’m one of the few that have had success so far with prostate cancer salvage therapy. Incidentally, there was no history in my family and I was getting PSA’s every two years as they were so stable. I was late by 6 months and the level jumped from 2 to 6 over 30 months. 12 quadrant biopsy proved I had it but at the time, they didn’t try to localize the tumor. Umm, I was only 59 when the tumor was discovered. So much for pooh-poohing PSA testing.
You can put lipstick on a pig, but after the application, it’s still a pig.
And, if a little 4 year-old girl puts on her mom’s clothes and shoes, and pretends to be a mother to her dolls, that does not mean she is ready to take care of other children, or bear them. She can pretend to be a mommy but of course, at that time, she is not a mommy.
I am not implying that nurse anesthetists are pigs.
I am not implying that nurse anesthetists are immature
I am implying that it is misleading and wrong to pretend to patients to be something that you are not.
Also, I am saying that the truth matters, and the truth here is that nurse anesthetists are valued members of the care team but they have not been exposed to the depths of training in the basic sciences that a physician undergoes.
If they wish to become anesthesiologists, they need to start by applying to become a student at a school of medicine.
As a response to the plastic surgeon, I am somewhat curious why our (or my) specialty organization is forever threatening to add on an additional year of residency. Of course they can always say that there is so much new technology which graduating residents must gain clinical
experience with and so much new information which we need to be educated about- so we really need an extra year just to be general ophthalmologists. Then there is fellowship training- so add on another year or two. Do you think maybe that there is a hidden reason in that doctors-in-training are simply cheap labor?
By the way I do believe in plastic surgery. For my family and myself (warning there is sometimes a turf war and I tend to refer my eye cases to an ophthalmic plastic surgeons) I will pay cash for your handiwork- you guys definitely have a knack for wound closure. I have seen ER physicians butcher eyelid margin lacerations. People with traumatic injuries generally are not good advocates, and the ER just wants to get them in and out (and of course that NP is generating money for them). Money is the name of the game.
So all of us here are simply preaching to the choir and it is always good to ventilate.
And one final note…….I hired a receptionist a few weeks ago who was pursuing an RN degree at a local college- 2 evening/week and Saturdays- and she stated she will have her license in TWO years. When I get old and sick and there is nurse taking care of me, please don’t tell me she just got her RN in 2 years! I understand there is a shortage of doctors, of nurses, of whomever…….is the solution to just dumb it down with online courses and open book exams and FAKE clinical experience?
by adding an online Doctorate that makes them a doctor of anesthesiology. For 99% of the patients they wont understand.
that means for CRNA with nursing school followed by a 3 year training vs vigorous 4 year pre medical education, 4 years of medical school, and 4 years of residency, the extra training and higher qualifications are moot.
Physicians should counter by dropping their training to the level of all the providers.
Premed and medical school should be 6 years total. Family practice should revert to general practice with a 1 year internship. Residencies should all be reduced to 3 years. Let the public get what it deserves.
Those of us in plastic surgery saw this starting 30 years ago. First, the specialty differential in payment for CPT codes was eliminated. A plastic surgeon with 300k in overhead is paid the same for a laceration from HMOs despite taking an evening off, and driving in to the hospital, as the NP spending 10 minutes while working a shift with NO overhead. Then every doctor and now NP have become cosmetic medicine doctors. While us plastic surgeons protested, we were told by our colleagues we were just rich plastic surgeons trying to protect our monopoly. Sadly, plastic surgeons have the least monopoly compared to cardiologists and others as we dont own a territory. We replied just wait it will happen to all of you if credentials dont matter, and it does.
Now our societies are more concerned with being woke and inclusive than this incursion
I am in a rural area in Florida. We have a nearby hospital that has NEVER had an anesthesiologist as a regular onsite member of the OR team. Oh yes there is an anesthesiologist on staff but he comes only when a surgeon demands his presence. When i started working at this hospital 37 years ago i was worried that i would be responsible for the CRNA but I was told that they were hospital employees (and good earners for the hospital) and as long as I did not specifically direct them, I would not be sued for their mistakes. As an ophthalmologist, I was forced to do my own blocks so I soon went elsewhere to a larger facility that could better serve me. And again for many years the anesthesiologist did my blocks at this other rural hospital. That hospital closed their OR and forced me to move my cases 20 miles away to the ASC at their mother ship. Here we we have 1 anesthesiologist supervising a CRNA in every room (3 rooms). So gradually I have seen less and less of of the anesthesiologist. Does anyone know if a patient can request that his case be done by an MD/DO rather than a CRNA? Again I am an opthalmologist. Can a patient going to a big eye clinic request that his exam be done by an MD/DO rather than the optometrist who is supposed to screen all the pateints? GUESS WHAT GUYS, the cost of the exam (billed directly to the patient or to the insurance) is the same…….THAT IS THE CRIME. When you pick a plumber, do want the guy who has been in business 20 years who owns his company or do you want to have him send his helper/apprentice. Guess what , the price is the same!!!!