Physician Assistants Making a Difference: A Retrospective Study on Discharge Times in Community Orthopedics
| dc.contributor.author | Smook, Troy | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2015-11-19T20:30:30Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2015-11-19T20:30:30Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2015-04 | |
| dc.degree.discipline | Medicine | en_US |
| dc.degree.level | Master of Physician Assistant Studies (M.P.A.S.) | en_US |
| dc.description.abstract | Intro: Physician Assistants (PAs) have been key components to health care teams around the world for quite some time now. In Canada PAs have been utilized very effectively in the Canadian Forces (CF) and are now transitioning to become integral members in civilian health care across the country, with Manitoba and Ontario leading the way. Doctors are seeing the many potential benefits of PAs but it is not always clear how best to utilize their unique skill sets and talents. Looking at how discharge times are affected is one way to analyze their effectiveness in practice. The purpose of this was paper was to look at a community orthopedic surgery service and investigate how hiring a PA affected discharge times postoperatively. Methods: 120 systematic chart reviews were completed at the health records office of the community health care center. Dates ranged from 6 months prior and 1 year after the PA was hired. To keep the sample size simple, one surgeon was chosen who specialized in total hip arthroplasties and total knee arthroplasties, with no bias being given to age or sex of the patient. Results: The first data set looked at 6 months prior to the PA starting. 45 cases were reviewed and the total length of stay for all cases was averaged and found to be 8.2 days postop. The next data set looked at 75 cases up to 1 year after the PA was hired. The average length of stay again was averaged and found to be 5.2 days postop. This shows that with the addition of one PA to the orthopedic team, they were able to decrease length of stay by, on average, 3 days. Conclusion: This data set proves that PAs are an effective member of the health care team and when used successfully, have dramatic positive benefits to the patients and the health care system as a whole. Not only do they increase effectiveness and efficiency of their supervising physicians, but also with reducing discharge times they are able to reduce costs to the medical system associated with longer hospital stays and associated medical resources. | en_US |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/1993/30941 | |
| dc.language.iso | eng | en_US |
| dc.rights | open access | en_US |
| dc.subject | discharge times | en_US |
| dc.subject | community orthopedics | en_US |
| dc.title | Physician Assistants Making a Difference: A Retrospective Study on Discharge Times in Community Orthopedics | en_US |
| dc.type | master thesis | en_US |