If patients are now "customers," what does that make physicians?
As patients become "members" and "customers," as physicians become "practitioners" and "providers," the practice of medicine becomes more complex and more demanding. The changes that have affected the daily lives of physicians across America will continue and will likely become even more dramatic in the future. There is much to mourn in the passing of the medical practice of the recent past, but there is every reason to celebrate the ongoing triumphs of medicine and its successes in improving the human condition. The job of being a physician is not becoming any less important. The job has just gotten tougher. Successful physicians will cope with the multitude of changes in which the health care field is engaged and make themselves effective agents of change within their organizations.
UltraLink, Inc., Costa Mesa, CA.
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D006279:Health Maintenance Organizations; D009936:Organizational Innovation; D010819:Physician's Role; D010817:Physician-Patient Relations; D011787:Quality of Health Care / Q000639:trends*; D012922:Social Change; D014481:United States