Increasing the ratio of nurse practitioners to physicians

Many practices have realized that mid-level practitioners can competently provide a subset of the care traditionally provided by physicians.  However, a practice with four physicians and no mid-levels would have to grow significantly to add four nurse practitioners and reach just a 1:1 ratio.  Imagine a large organization with 50 or more physicians and you see one problem with delegating appropriate clinical tasks with any scale.  Of course that is the "Build" answer to the Build vs Buy question.  Allina Hospitals and Clinics have taken a different approach, kind of a rent to own path.  Other large organizations may follow suit if it works well and they are able to shift care from their Emergency Departments to the Minute Clinics while maintaining continuity with their primary care physicians.

The blurb below is from the ACPE Daily Digest.  Enjoy!

Allina, MinuteClinic partner to coordinate care for patients, share EMRs.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune (10/30, Yee) reports that Minnesota's "Allina Hospitals and Clinics is teaming up with MinuteClinic to coordinate care for patients and expand medical services down the road." Under the deal, "Allina doctors will offer medical oversight to MinuteClinic nurse practitioners...and the two organizations will share electronic medical records." Still, "neither organization will take a stake in the other, nor will they pay each other referral fees."

        Allina and MinuteClinic "will forward patients to each other and integrate their healthcare delivery systems," the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal (10/29, Newmarker, subscription required) reported.