The Practice of Nursing in Pediatric Offices — Challenge and Opportunity

Abstract

The ratio of active nurses to physicians is 35 times as high in hospitals as in physicians' offices although most physicians spend most of their time in office practice. A survey of 90 per cent of the board-certified practicing pediatricians in the United States disclosed that office nurses in all types of practice arrangements performed services that could be more appropriately carried out by technicians and aides. Nurses were infrequently assigned patient-care tasks, although pediatricians were favorably disposed to their delegation. Such tasks were most often delegated by the physician in solo practice employing three or more workers of whom one was a nurse. Consumer demand and dissatisfaction may lead to greater interprofessional sharing of ambulatory patient care, a movement that logic and insight alone have not yet produced.