The Role Of The Medical Consultant

The Role Of The Medical Consultant is organized by Society of Hospital Medicine (SHM).

Dates:
Release Date: October 6, 2017
Expiration Date: October 6, 2020

Accreditation:
The Society of Hospital Medicine designates this activity for a maximum of 2 AMA PRA Category 1 Credits™ / 2.00 ABIM MOC Self Evaluation Points

Goal:
To educate hospitalists about their evolving role as medical consultants and to improve patient care by improving the consultant’s ability to communicate with and understand the needs of the referring physicians.

Overview
Medical consultation is an important clinical component for most hospitalists. Traditionally, consultants evaluated patients at the request of the referring physician (RP) and provided an assessment and recommendations. Today, hospitalists are also asked to provide both “curbside” advice and more comprehensive comanagement of medical problems. Hospitalists who are effective consultants communicate skillfully and act professionally. The following module describes the different roles that hospitalists can perform as medical consultants and provides strategies for improving communication and RP satisfaction.

Learning Objectives:
After completing the module, the participant should be able to:
• Recognize why consultative medicine is an important topic and describe how it has been traditionally performed.
• Compare the different responsibilities and expectations of the medical consultant when performing comanagement or curbside consultation.
• Assess strategies that may increase referring physician (RP) compliance with the consultant’s recommendations.
• Propose methods that promote more effective communication with RPs through verbal discussion.
• Formulate methods that promote more effective communication with RPs through written consultation reports.
• Propose professional behavior for medical consultants.

Additional details will be posted as soon as information is available.