The complexity of the office visit for primary care physicians — based on the number of visit diagnoses reported — tends to be higher than for subspecialist physicians, according to recent research from the Robert Graham Center.
The study was conducted by Robert Graham Center economist Miranda Moore, PhD, and her colleagues. Together, they measured the number of health conditions addressed by primary care physicians in a single patient visit and compared them to the number of conditions addressed by subspecialists.
They found 90 percent of the primary care physician visits addressed four diagnoses while 70 percent of the subspecialist physician visits addressed only one diagnosis.
Although the findings are not altogether surprising, they do have important implications for payment policies.
"As we move forward with changing the way we pay for care, we need to look at the breadth of what's being addressed within each office visit to measure complexity," said Dr. Moore. "We need to consider various measures of the complexity of care physicians provide in a single visit."
More articles on primary care:
IHI Patient Safety Director highlights 5 safety issues in primary care settings
5 things to know about communication errors, patient safety in general medicine
Primary care physician survey reveals strengths and weaknesses in patient care in Massachusetts