On January 31, U.S.
News & World Report ran an article
titled “Medicine’s Turf Wars.” http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/articles/050131/31turf.htm
The article discussed several areas
of medicine in which nonphysician health care providers are seeking
to expand their services, giving rise to
questions of patient safety, adequate training,
and the right to perform certain procedures. The
article focused closely on the regulation
of such services as administering anesthesia,
writing prescriptions, and performing surgery,
and called the delineation of responsibilities
between anesthesiologists and nurse anesthetists “the
mother of all turf battles.” In
the February 28 issue of US News & World Report, the following
letter from ASA President Eugene P. Sinclair,
M.D. appears:
The American Society Of Anesthesiologists
does not see the delivery of anesthesia care as
a turf battle between doctors and nurses. Where's
the patient in that equation? Anesthesiologists
provide safe pain relief for the sickest, the oldest,
and the tiniest patients--which until recently
would have been considered too risky. The safety
of anesthesia is about much more than who is delivering
the drugs. It is about the science, knowledge,
training, and skill that go into assessing the
patient before, during, and after surgery. Patients
benefit most when they receive the best care that
medicine has to offer combined with the best care
that nursing has to offer. In the ideal scenario,
our efforts are blended, not divided.
EUGENE P. SINCLAIR, M.D.
President
American Society of Anesthesiologists
Park Ridge, Ill.