New Hospitalists Optimize Care for Lake Forest Hospital Patients
Seven new hospitalist physicians have joined the staff of Lake Forest Hospital, doubling the number of hospitalists on staff who are available onsite 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to hospitalized patients and their families. Hospitalists are board-certified in internal medicine but do not have an outside private practice, instead choosing to manage the care of hospital patients, including those in the intensive care unit.
"This expanded coverage by hospitalists will provide our patients with the highest quality of clinical safety and patient service," said Michael G. Ankin, MD, FACP, FCCP, a pulmonologist at Lake Forest Hospital and the hospital's vice president of medical affairs and chief medical officer. "Adding these excellent physicians will also create full alignment with the hospitalists at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago to ensure seamless coordination in the event a patient needs to be transferred."
Hospitalists help patients through the continuum of hospital care, often seeing patients in the Emergency Department and, if they are admitted, following them into the acute care or critical care unit and ultimately organizing post-hospital care. Hospitalists closely monitor patients and take immediate action when necessary, ordering tests and procedures, following-up on test results and adjusting treatment plans. Hospitalists coordinate patients' care with their primary care physician, subspecialists, nurses and any other needed services or departments within the hospital to create a safer and more effective healing environment. Hospitalists help address family questions and concerns as well.
Hospital medicine is one of the fastest-growing specialties in the history of American medicine, and yet not all institutions have these physicians on their hospital staff. At some hospitals, it is not uncommon to experience minimal daily contact with a physician or to wait for decisions and results from the offsite physician or specialist. This also means fragmented, longer hospital stays that can lead to confusion for patients and their families. As a result, and through a renewed emphasis on quality improvement at hospitals, there has been a national push for hospitalists.
"A hospitalist can go directly to a patient when needed" continued Ankin. The immediacy with which a hospitalist can act is a great benefit for patients, and care by hospitalists has been shown to improve hospital stays."
Lake Forest Hospital's new hospitalists include:
• Anub Abraham, DO
• Ratika Gupta, MD
• Diana A. Guse, MD
• Alice Jacob, MD
• Amitkumar R. Patel, MD, MBA, FACP, SFHM
• Jehanzeb A. Sheikh, MD
• Dale Adam VanderWaal, MD
To learn more about these and other hospitalists at Lake Forest Hospital, along with the hospital medicine specialty, visit lfh.org/hospital_medicine.