DR. & ROUND EVERY DAY??????

Specialties Psychiatric

Published

Specializes in Med Surg/Tele/Ortho/Psych.

By law, does a dr. Have to see his patient every day?

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Specializes in Psych, med surg.

Not positive on this, and I think it would depend on the state. I'm in Iowa and each pt must be seen by a doctor every weekday and on one of the weekend days. It doesn't have to be that pt's attending doctor, however.

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Specializes in Psych (25 years), Medical (15 years).
...each pt must be seen by a doctor every weekday and on one of the weekend days. It doesn't have to be that pt's attending doctor, however.

shell5: Same here in Illinois.

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Specializes in Med Surg/Tele/Ortho/Psych.

I am in Texas and I believe the patients are supposed to be seen every day, but our doctors will go 3 days without seeing the patients on our inpatient unit sometimes. It is so embarressing. I think it is so unprofessional too. Some of the pts have turned them in and nothing has been done.

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Specializes in Psych, EMS.
I am in Texas and I believe the patients are supposed to be seen every day, but our doctors will go 3 days without seeing the patients on our inpatient unit sometimes. It is so embarressing. I think it is so unprofessional too. Some of the pts have turned them in and nothing has been done.

Same here..I'm in Texas and it is not uncommon for our pts to go several days w/o seeing the MD. It doesn't seem right to me.

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Specializes in Psych.

WHAT???? Are we talking acute inpatient here? On my unit the patients are seen daily by their attending, on the weekends they are seen daily by one of our consistent building attendings, who have received a "hand off" on Friday! I have no idea at all about what the law requires, but good care dictates such a practice. I think the law gets involved when there is billing involved (Medicare/Medicaid).

Certainly if it was a long term facility (do those exist anywhere???), being seen every few days would seem reasonable, but NOT in acute care!

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Everywhere I've worked for many years (decades), clients in acute care settings get seen by a physician every day (including both days of the weekend). I, too, have no idea what the "law" is, but it seems a minimum standard of good practice, IMO.

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Specializes in Med Surg/Tele/Ortho/Psych.

thanks

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