Bringing PAs and NPs on board

Have you considered hiring Nurse Practitioners or Physician Assistants? An article published by American Medical News offers some tips on what to consider:

• They suggest the first step to determine if the new hire (the NP or the PA) would indeed help your practice. You can also look into State regulations to make your decision.
• For example: nurse practitioners can prescribe in 50 states, but only 47 states for controlled substances
• Nurse practitioners can practice independently in 16 states.
• Some states require a physician to audit a percentage of the charts.
• Nurse Practitioners are regulated by the state board of nursing and physician assistants are regulated by their state's medical board.
• Physician assistants are usually hired if you want them to do "technical procedures"
• Nurse practitioners are usually hired if you want them to deal with more of the "evaluation and management" aspect.
• You will need to set up credentialing for the practitioner (which can take months)
• Background checks are important as well as a license check with the state board before you hire them
• Use the proper title for the person you are hiring - in the interview process as well as after they get hired - if you don't use their proper title it can confuse patients as to who they are seeing.

The number of NPs and PAs has increased over the years. Since 1996-2009 the number of nurse practitioners went up from 70,993 to 158,348 and physicians assistants went up from 29,161 to 73,893.

To view the full article, please click here: Bringing PAs and NPs on board

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