Physicians are being asked to do more than ever — but some of those demands may be getting in the way of the work that matters most.
Three physician leaders shared what they believe healthcare organizations and the system as a whole need to stop asking of physicians, pointing to burdensome technology, systemic dysfunction and workflows that pull clinicians away from patient care.
Editor’s note: Responses have been lightly edited for clarity and length.
Question: What’s one thing the healthcare system is asking of physicians today that you think needs to stop?
James Augustine, MD. Medical Director for Lee County EMS (Fort Myers, Fla.): Mandated use of very unfriendly computer systems, which don’t contribute to good practice .
Peter Bravos, MD. Chief Medical Officer of Sutter Health’s Surgery Center Division (Yuba City, Calif.): Asking physicians to personally absorb systemic dysfunction and calling it resilience. When the schedule is broken, the staffing is thin, and the administrative load keeps climbing, a wellness webinar isn’t a solution. It’s a way of relocating a system’s problem onto the individual and then measuring the individual for how well they cope with it. Resilience was never meant to be a substitute for fixing the conditions that exhaust people. Build systems worthy of the people working in them, and resilience takes care of itself.
Walter Allen Fink, DO. Associate Vice President and Chief Medical Officer UT Health San Antonio: We need to stop putting unnecessary things between physicians and the work they were educated and trained to do.
Too much physician time is spent working around inefficient processes, navigating technology, dealing with fragmented workflows, and doing tasks that do not really require a physician’s expertise.
For me, this is bigger than just reducing administrative burden. We should be designing systems that allow physicians to spend more of their time caring for patients, making complex clinical decisions, talking with patients and families, and improving care.
When we get unnecessary friction out of the way, physicians can spend more time doing what they do best — and that is better for patients, physicians and the healthcare system.
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