During Covid outbreaks nurses willing to relocate for temporary assignments could command a huge premium over their regular wages. Hospitals overwhelmed with patients had little choice but to pay whatever it took to recruit scarce nurses. As I’ve said in the past, hospitals are loath to raise nurses’ pay. They often hire temporary nursing staffing at much higher rates than raise the standard pay to recruit staff nurses. During Covid outbreaks hospitals’ unwillingness to compensate nurses for the heightened risk and heavier workloads caused many to jump ship and join traveling nurse agencies.
Category: Doctors & Hospitals
Washington Post: Medical Students Losing Interest in Emergency Medicine
March 17 was Match Day, the day when nearly 43,000 medical school graduates discovered where they would spend the next three to seven years finishing their graduate medical training. Residency is required before medical school graduates can practice medicine in the United States.
Monday Links
- FREOPP: Switzerland leads the world in health care innovation.
- Misspending and fraud in pandemic relief may be as high as $400 billion. Can we get the money back?
- IRS: You can use your HSA, HRA or FSA to pay for a gym membership, so long as you doctor “prescribes” the membership, say, for weight loss.
- Biden supports “gender affirming” pediatric care.
- New and more rigorous study: Women who married had a 35% lower risk of death for any reason, lower risk of cardiovascular disease, less depression and loneliness; and they were happier and more optimistic, and had a greater sense of purpose and hope.
- EVT is creating radically better outcomes for stroke victims, but only a handful of hospitals offer it. Telemedicine helps. (NYT)
Can’t Find a Doctor Who Takes Medicare, Medicaid or Obamacare? Blame Congress (and the AMA)!
Imagine spending most of your life preparing to be a doctor. You get straight As in high school and college. You are accepted to medical school and four years later you graduate with a Doctor of Medicine degree. Your training is not over, however. Medical school graduates must go through a residency training program, which is a requirement to practice medicine in all 50 states. Not all medical graduates will be accepted into residency. In other words, the National Resident Matching Program (Match) is a game of musical chairs, where the losers lose not only their seat but often their career.