Advancing the practice of trauma: utilizing advanced practice providers to improve patient outcomes through a collaborative team approach

Abstract

Advanced practice providers (APPs) have become essential to trauma teams in the United States during the last few decades. The optimal utilization of APPs is not yet known and is likely highly variable secondary to many factors. We discuss three aspects of the multidisciplinary approach to caring for trauma patients. First, a review of the literature demonstrates that APPs in trauma improve quality of care, patient throughput, and decrease cost. We then report on models of APP utilization by comparing five trauma centers across the country, concluding that utilization remains highly variable due to several system and provider factors. The final portion of this review highlights current billing and coding practices in integrated teams considering recent changes to Centers for Medicare and Medicaid rules in 2024.

Keywords: Education, Medical; Multiple Trauma; medical coding; nurse practitioner; patient care teams; physician assistant; trauma surgery; treatment outcome.