There is a
national bill in the House of Representative called "Truth in
Healthcare Marketing Act of 2013," (HR 1427). This would clarify for
patients’ who someone is in healthcare.
Even if they
have a doctorate or PhD, a nurse practitioner, chiropractor, physician
assistant or psychologists is not a medical doctor. If you are treating someone
in my family I want to know your background. I am proud to be a nurse
practitioner and we have a lot of
power as NPs. We perform physical examinations, diagnose and treat illnesses,
order and interpret tests, prescribe medications in most states, and plan and
implement therapeutic interventions.
On the other
hand, I am not foolish enough to put myself in a class with most medical
doctors, and patients should not guess who is wearing the white coat. I have
met only one NP who was narcissistic and insisted she be called doctor by staff. Beside setting herself up for a lawsuit, I
won’t tell you what the staff called her behind her back.
This is a relevant
topic because to be blunt, many patients are not educated enough, and have no
clue to know the difference between the people in white coats. I wear a white
coat now, but even in my nursing scrubs with my RN badge on, patients regularly
call me doctor, and probably only because I am a male. Talk about confused.
Truthfully, anyone
with a PhD or doctorate can call themselves a doctor, but that does not make
them a medical doctor. In fact there are a lot of people out there in the world
with PhDs and doctorates who like to be called doctor, and that is fine.
However, I would never have them touch or get close to a real human being. Thousands of people have Honorary Doctorate
degrees like Stephen Colbert or Bill Cosby and can call themselves doctors. Do
you really want them, a psychologist like Dr. Phil or the guy at the gas
station with a PhD diagnosing your intracranial bleeding or cardiovascular
disease?
Thank God I know
some doctors well enough to ask them medical questions, and I do so often. I am not
a fool and will not pretend that I have the same education as a medical doctor.
MD's learn the
medical model and as medical students they spend 10-15 years in higher
education, medical schools and residency, and if they specialize add more years
to that.
A nurse
practitioner learns the nursing model and may spend 6-8 years in school.
However, nurse practitioners are better and
more equipped to deal with patients in several ways. We were trained to treat
people more holistically and not just in a narrow allopathic or western form of
medicine. We communicate better with patients and their families. We see the
big picture more often. In most hospitals I have worked and research papers I
have read, nurse practitioners consistently have a higher overall patient satisfaction
score.
Most docs love us and as NPs and PAs we
are part of the solution to the primary care shortage. But a few bad apples can
ruin it for a lot of people when it comes to trust and working together.
10 comments:
Well said! I need my physician partners...our patients can be so complex, I am always happy to take advantage of their expertise. And they recognize my strengths with some of the more complicated psychosocial issues. It is a win-win situation.
PediNP, exactly can't beat their experience. I am lucky and love the docs I work with now. Good relationships go far in the clinic.
Point of parliamentary procedure, your honor!
Bill Cosby earned his doctorate (education) at UMASS Amherst in 1976. He does have like 25 honorary degrees but also the regular Ed.D.
Anonymous, true he has an Ed D. Would not trust him to touch a sick patient though.
Interesting Article..........
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www.mdconferencefinder.com - Find Medical Conferences World Wide.
Interesting piece though I disagree with a couple points. First and foremost, the term Doctor is an academic title, not an indication of one's profession; in contrast the term physician (or nurse practitioner, or audiologist, or physical therapist) is applicable to a profession. Second, it is not ego or arrogance that leads to proper titling, it is the ongoing effort to stop discounting care provided by nurse practitioners (for example, I expect nurse practioners to be addressed as Mr./Ms. xxxx in any environment that their colleagues are addressed as Dr. yyyy, and upon earning a doctorate I will expect they should be addressed as Dr. xxxx; in contrast where everyone goes by first name, I have no issue with being addressed in that informal way); it is an issue of collegiality. Finally, the issue of using the term doctor by a nurse is problematic for physicians in a way that is not seen with chiropractors, psychologists, or optometrists - why? I submit that it is because physician ego is such that they believe nurses are, or should be, submissive to the whim of the physician in a way that other professionals are not. The issue is not patient confusion, it is an issue of physician ego and 'turf'. Nobody is claiming that a DNP is the same as an MD but then neither is a PsyD, EdD, PhD, DPT, or PharmD. There are differences in training, philosophy, expertise in each of these areas but that does not make one 'less than' another.
Anonymous, you can tell people to call you whatever you want.
However, do not fool patients and others into them thinking you are a medical doctor, if you are an NP. I have met different healthcare professionals who tell people they are a doctor and do not clarify. One NP was so arrogant she had the staff call her doctor, her terrible attitude had the opposite effect on her co-workers and they lost respect for her.
In my PCPs office there are several NPs, one calls herself a Dr. She actually wrote me an RX for something I am highly allergic to, I'm talking go to ER and be intubated for! What is it?...most RN,NPs I've seen have enough sense to read a chart. I'm retired from ICU and can't get thru to this woman...I think narcissistic is way beyond what I'd call her.She doesn't listen to the patient and she talks down to us, even those of us that are retired with the same RN background.
Dazed and confused to Dr A. S. FNP-C...
I am an NP and my PHd took almost 4 years. There is ultrasound tech with a PHd that everyone addresses as Dr. __ and of course is a male. I am female, and I am Mrs.
I can say many horror stories about physicians and surgeons but I am not going there. A doctor title given by any university is to be respected and used by the person who earned it.So a DNP should introduce herself and insist others to call her a doctor rightfully. I can tell you why nurse practitioners are equal or better providers:
1. Medical model has made this country to have most expensive and least effective healthcare system contributed by physician greed.
2. NPs do not prescribe controlled substances to increase revenue and patients
3. Take time to listen and provide optimal care with more health education and less prescriptions.
4. A nurse practitioner will take due care of you if you have insurance or not because of the nursing philosophy of caring for everyone.
So it is time to wake up to the reality and go to a nurse practitioner if you want to live a healthy long life.
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