Hospitalists

Our hospitalists also serve as an important bridge between inpatient and primary care, communicating with referring physicians about their patient’s status while they are hospitalized. Hospitalists are onsite at all times, day or night. They streamline the admission and discharge process, a service that improves safety and timeliness of care for the patient and family. In addition, this minimizes hospital costs, as our hospitalists make sure that patients who are ready to go home get discharged as soon as possible.

Hospitalists also provide on-site pediatric care at Emanuel Medical Center in Turlock, Bakersfield Memorial in Bakersfield, and Mercy San Juan Hospital in Carmichael, providing 24-hour inpatient physician coverage for pediatric patients.

Ensuring continuity and quality of care

Hospitalists play an integral role in a patient’s care while in the hospital. In addition to providing 24/7 coverage on acute care units, they lead several important roles in a patient’s care and in our hospital:

• Serve as the “pediatrician of record” during a patient’s stay. They coordinate with the primary care physician and all subspecialists that need to see the individual patient.
• Provide rapid assessment to any child who takes a turn for the worse. When necessary, the hospitalist supervises and coordinates the child’s transfer to the pediatric intensive care unit and assumes care for children who are ready to transfer to the acute care floor from the pediatric intensive care unit.
• Teach the next generation of pediatric physicians. Hospitalists supervise pediatric residents on Patient Centered Rounds.
• Actively participate in medical staff committees to continually review medical care and promote patient safety.
• Follow national guidelines and evidence-based medicine practices to provide the most up-to-date care.
• Enhance quality of care by developing and monitoring many clinical pathways to guide other pediatric healthcare providers in caring for many different conditions.