BACKGROUND Physicians are uniquely qualified to educate legislators about health care issues, but little is known about how physicians lobby members of Congress. METHODS From the staff of 84 randomly selected members of Congress (49 senators and 35 representatives), we interviewed the legislative assistants who work on health care legislation and meet with constituents and lobbyists on behalf...

BACKGROUND Although urinary incontinence is a challenge and a burden to older patients, many clinicians fail to query older patients about incontinence symptoms or, even when aware of a problem, fail to diagnose the underlying cause or recommend treatment. We wanted to compare the approaches of physician assistants, nurse practitioners, and family physicians to detection, diagnosis, and initial...

Nurse practitioners (NPs) and physician assistants (PAs) now outnumber family practice doctors in the United States and are the principal providers of primary care to many communities. Recent growth of these professions has occurred amidst considerable cross-state variation in their regulation, with some states permitting autonomous practice and others mandating extensive physician oversight. I...

A major contributor to shortfalls in delivery of recommended health care services is lack of physician time. On the basis of recommendations from national clinical care guidelines for preventive services and chronic disease management, and including the time needed for acute concerns, sufficiently addressing the needs of a standard patient panel of 2,500 would require 21.7 hours per day. The pr...

Due to looming physician shortages and the increase in demand for quality medical care for the newly insured, as well as the aging Baby Boomer population, there has never been a more important time for physicians, administrators, and the public to endorse and develop the role that nurse practitioners (NPs) and physician assistants (PAs) will play in the future of medical practice. One way to be...