Q: What are the biggest changes you’d like to see in the field?

A: One of the big things I have seen over this past year is the whole MOC (Maintenance of Certification) path debate. As nebulous as it has been for internal medicine, in general, I think it is even more so for hospitalists. So having a kind of clear, more practical path for hospitalists would be one of the biggest changes I would like to see. I think the current discussion is healthy. I think it provides a good forum for, hopefully, some positive changes, and I hope that also translates into positive changes for hospitalists as well.

Q: Academic HM can be a real time crunch, between clinical care and classes. How do you balance?

A: Balancing patient care with teaching is one of the big struggles that educators find nowadays, and I think you have to get creative. Obviously, the goal for me as an educator when I am on the wards is to help the trainees take better care of their patients.

So the more I can find ways to be able to provide great patient care, but do it in a way that also either allows the residents or students to learn to do that themselves or to be able to model that for them, then debrief with them afterwards, the more I can achieve that goal.

I have started to learn there are many different ways to be able to do that. And so being able to go into the day as prepared as you can be, and try to have a good plan in place with also plan B and plan C, if necessary, depending on how the day goes, I think is what has helped me.