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Hospitalists

Provide inpatient care predominantly in settings such as medical wards, acute care units, intensive care units, rehabilitation centers, or emergency rooms. Manage and coordinate patient care throughout treatment.

What you’d do

  • Diagnose, treat, or provide continuous care to hospital inpatients.
  • Prescribe medications or treatment regimens to hospital inpatients.
  • Order or interpret the results of tests such as laboratory tests and radiographs (x-rays).
  • Admit patients for hospital stays.
  • Conduct discharge planning and discharge patients.
  • Write patient discharge summaries and send them to primary care physicians.
  • Refer patients to medical specialists, social services, or other professionals as appropriate.
  • Direct, coordinate, or supervise the patient care activities of nursing or support staff.

Skills that matter

  • Active Learning
  • Active Listening
  • Complex Problem Solving
  • Critical Thinking
  • Judgment and Decision Making
  • Reading Comprehension

How to get there

Extensive preparation: most need graduate school, such as a master's degree or higher

Also called

  • Hospitalist
  • Hospitalist Medical Doctor (Hospitalist MD)
  • MD (Medical Doctor)
  • Physician
  • Academic Hospitalist
  • Consultant Physician

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