New health professions after a decade and a half: delegation, productivity and costs in primary care

Abstract

Though knowledge about physician's assistants and nurse practitioners is far from conclusive, these new health practitioners (NHPs) appear to perform a large percentage of primary care services at a high level of quality and productivity. Moreover, the gap between the physician/NHP substitution ratio and the NHP/physician cost ratio seems wide enough to assure cost savings when NHPs are used well.

PIP: Although knowledge about physicians' assistants and nurse practitioners is far from conclusive, review of the literature indicates that these new health practitioners (NHPs) appear to perform a large percentage of primary care services at a high level of productivity in the U.S. Moreover, the gap between the physician/NHP substitution ratio and the NHP/physician cost ratio seems wide enough to assure cost savings when NHPs are used well.