The Impact of Nurse and Support Staff and Relative Contributions to Patient Satisfaction Outcomes: A Production Function Approach to Determining Optimal Staffing

Hospitals have increasingly relied on nurse assistants to support nurses in the provision of patient care, yet knowledge about their contributions to the patient experience in US hospitals is limited. Although registered nurses are more impactful, nurse assistants are the more underdeployed staffing category. Given their lower labor costs, further employment of nurse assistants may…

Dental Education and Factors Associated with Medicaid Pediatric Dental Education

Children enrolled in Medicaid have more difficulty obtaining access to care than those children who are privately insured. The factors that influence dentists’ willingness to accept Medicaid patients are not well understood. This article describes a study that analyzed 2016 American Dental Association data on dentist practice characteristics, location, and educational background to examine what…

Optimal Staffing in Community Health Centers to Improve Quality of Care

As quality incentives are further integrated into payment systems, community health centers (CHCs) will need to optimize their workforce configuration to improve quality. Given the relative efficiency of advanced practice clinicians in producing quality, further hiring of these professionals is a cost‐effective investment for CHCs. This article explores optimal workforce configurations in the production of…

Understanding Why Nurse Practitioner and Physician Assistant Productivity Varies Across Community Health Centers: A Comparative Qualitative Analysis

Advanced practice clinicians (APCs)—nurse practitioners and physician assistants—that are in the 90th percentile of community health centers (CHCs) provide about 1,840 adjusted-visits per year; whereas APCs in the 10th percentile CHCs provide about 978 adjusted-visits per year. Several important conditions were found among high productivity CHCs, including scheduling APCs and physicians for the same number…

Does Prior Community College Attendance Predict Diversity in Health Professions School? The Case of Physician Assistants

Community college (CC) is important for providing access to educational pathways for students from disadvantaged backgrounds. However, studies show that medical schools are less likely to accept qualified students who went to CC and thus may be missing opportunities to increase the diversity of their student body. This article describes a study that analyzed data…

Does Community College Attendance Affect Matriculation to a Physician Assistant Program? A Pathway to Increase Diversity in the Health Professions

Community colleges (CC) are an important pathway to the physician assistant (PA) profession, with 3 of 4 matriculants having a CC background. However, lower matriculation rates among similarly qualified applicants who transferred from a CC to a 4-year university compared to applicants with no CC background suggest that PA programs are missing important opportunities for…

Effects of Completing a Postgraduate Residency or Fellowship Program on Primary Care Nurse Practitioners’ Transition to Practice

Postgraduate residency and fellowship programs have become more common in recent years as a means of helping nurse practitioners (NPs) transition to practice. More research is needed to understand the efficacy of these programs for NPs working in primary care settings. This article describes a study that analyzed 2018 survey data to examine possible associations…

State Health Workforce Deficit Estimator

The Health Workforce Deficit Estimator is an online tool to help state and federal planners consider different strategic approaches to ensure sufficient heath workforce for COVID-19. Built off the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation demand model, the tool currently shows deficits in supply for respiratory therapists, intensivists, hospitalists, and critical care nurses in certain…

Independent Freestanding Emergency Departments and Implications for the Rural Emergency Physician Workforce in Texas

Independent freestanding emergency departments (IFEDs) have increased rapidly over the last decade, especially in Texas. This growth calls for a closer look into the implications of these new models of health care organizations. This article examines the IFED physician workforce composition and changes in emergency physician workforce supply across states and in rural Texas.ArrayArticle Arrayhttps://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1475-6773.13587November…

COVID-19 County Workforce Deficit Estimator

The Mullan Institute estimates that between now and March 20, 2021, 7% of counties in the USwill experience hospital workforce staffing strains due to COVID-19 hospitalizations. Using new county-level projections of COVID-19 hospitalizations and ICU occupancy provided, it is estimated that 209 counties will need to implement crisis workforce strategies. This involves tiered staffing strategies…

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