With family doctors increasingly overburdened, bureaucratized, and burned out, how can the field change before it's too late? Over the past few decades, as American medical practice has become increasingly specialized, the number of generalists—doctors who care for the whole person—has plummeted. On paper, family medicine sounds noble; in practice, though, the field is so demanding in scope and substance, and the health system so favorable to specialists, that it cannot be fulfilled by most doctors. In Searching for the Family Doctor, Timothy J. Hoff weaves together the early history of the family practice specialty in the United States with the personal narratives of modern-day family doctors. By formalizing this area of practice and instituting specialist-level training requirements, the originators of family practice hoped to increase respect for generalists, improve the pipeline of young medical graduates choosing primary care, and, in so doing, have a major positive impact on the way patients receive care. Drawing on in-depth interviews with fifty-five family doctors, Hoff shows us how these medical professionals have had their calling transformed not only by the indifferent acts of an unsupportive health care system but by the hand of their own medical specialty—a specialty that has chosen to pursue short- over long-term viability, conformity over uniqueness, and protectionism over collaboration. A specialty unable to innovate to keep its membership cohesive and focused on fulfilling the generalist ideal. The family doctor, Hoff explains, was conceived of as a powered-up version of the "country doctor" idea. At a time when doctor-patient relationships are evaporating in the face of highly transactional, fast-food-style medical practice, this ideal seems both nostalgic and revolutionary. However, the realities of highly bureaucratic reimbursement and quality-of-care requirements, educational debt, and ongoing consolidation of the old-fashioned independent doctor's office into corporate health systems have stacked the deck against the altruists and true believers who are drawn to the profession of family practice. As more family doctors wind up working for big health care corporations, their career paths grow more parochial, balkanizing the specialty. Their work roles and professional identities are increasingly niche-oriented. Exploring how to save primary care by giving family doctors a fighting chance to become the generalists we need in our lives, Searching for the Family Doctor is required reading for anyone interested in the troubled state of modern medicine.

Named a 2013 Doody's Core Title! "This is a wonderful book for both novice and experienced physician assistants and nurse practitioners. This latest edition will see frequent use in your daily practice."Score: 100, 5 stars--Doody's Medical Reviews "This textbook provides comprehensive coverage of primary care disorders in an easy-to-read format and contains invaluable step-by-step instructions for evaluating and managing primary care patients. . . [It] belongs in every NP and PA's reference library. I highly recommend this wonderful textbook." Maria T. Leik, MSN, FNP-BC, ANP-BC, GNP-BC President, National ARNP Services, Inc. "Family Practice Guidelines is an excellent resource for the busy clinician. It offers succinct, comprehensive information in an easy format that is particularly useful for quick reference. This text is useful for general practice settings as well as specialty care." Anne Moore, APN; WHNP/ANP-BC; FAANP Vanderbilt University The second edition of Family Practice Guidelines is a comprehensive resource for clinicians, presenting current national standard of care guidelines for practice, in addition to select 2011 guidelines. This clinical reference features detailed physical examination and diagnostic testing, information on health promotion, guidelines of care, dietary information, national resources for patient use, and patient education handouts all in one resource. This revised edition features guidelines for 246 disorders, each containing clearly outlined considerations for pediatric, pregnant, and geriatric patients. It also presents 18 procedures commonly performed in the clinical setting, including bedside cystometry, hernia reduction, neurological examination, and more. Patient Teaching Guides are also provided, and are designed to be given directly to patients as take home teaching supplements. Additionally, the book contains four appendices with guidelines on normal lab values, procedures, sexual maturity stages, and teeth. New to this Edition: Select 2011 guidelines Over 17 new protocols including: ADD/ADHD, Menopause, Migraine, Chronic Kidney Disease in Adults, Obesity/Gastric Bypass, and more Completely updated Patient Teaching Guides, including a new entry on Anticoagulation Therapy for Patients with AFib, to tear out and send home with patients Addition of consultation and referral recommendations New chapter presenting Pain Management Guidelines for acute and chronic pain Completely updated national treatment guidelines

After years of school and maybe even after some years of practice, you are ready to do it on your own. Running a profitable business takes more than just being a great doctor. Start Your Own Medical Practice provides you with the knowledge to be both a great doctor and a successful business owner. Whether you are looking to open a single practice office or wanting to go into partnership with other colleagues, picking the right location, hiring the right support staff and taking care of all the finances are not easy tasks. With help from Start Your Own Medical Practice, you can be sure you are making the best decisions for success. Don't let a wrong choice slow down your progress. Find advice to: --Create a Business Plan --Manage the Office --Raise Capital --Bill Your Patients --Market Your Practice --Build a Patient Base --Prevent Malpractice Suits --Keep an Eye on the Goal With checklists, sample letters and doctor's office forms, Start Your Own Medical Practice teaches you all the things they didn't in medical school and gives you the confidence to go out and do it on your own.

Heirs of General Practice is a frieze of glimpses of young doctors with patients of every age—about a dozen physicians in all, who belong to the new medical specialty called family practice. They are people who have addressed themselves to a need for a unifying generalism in a world that has become greatly subdivided by specialization, physicians who work with the "unquantifiable idea that a doctor who treats your grandmother, your father, your niece, and your daughter will be more adroit in treating you." These young men and women are seen in their examining rooms in various rural communities in Maine, but Maine is only the example. Their medical objectives, their successes, the professional obstacles they do and do not overcome are representative of any place family practitioners are working. While essential medical background is provided, McPhee's masterful approach to a trend significant to all of us is replete with affecting, and often amusing, stories about both doctors and their charges.

For more than 25 years, this trusted reference has guided physicians through every aspect of their practice, offering advice that has encouraged excellence, strengthened careers, and broadened patient bases. Now thoroughly updated and streamlined, the 6th edition features many all-new chapters and meticulous revisions to reflect the latest approaches and findings. This new edition is a comprehensive, authoritative source that helps readers meet every clinical and professional challenge they face.

Whether you offer comprehensive pregnancy care in your primary care facility, or provide prenatal and postpartum care, this book delivers the guidance you need to optimize health for both mothers and their babies. It covers all aspects of birth care, from preconception counseling and prenatal care, through labor and delivery (both low-risk and complicated), to postpartum care and the first month of life. The completely revised third edition includes the most up-to- date, evidence-based standards of care. It offers information that is patient centered, prevention oriented, educational, and sensitive to the care of the whole woman and her family. Features a reader-friendly outline/narrative format for ease of use in daily clinical practice. Describes how to care for patients with a wide range of medical conditions during pregnancy as well as pregnancy-related conditions. Takes a whole-family approach to maternity care, with discussions of maternal and paternal adjustment, marital adjustment, sibling adjustment, single-parent families, and return-to-work issues. Provides patient and family education materials on a full range of topics, from nutrition in pregnancy to breastfeeding. Features a section on alternative medicine in maternity care. Provides detailed instruction for a wide array of procedures, including cesarean delivery, perineal repair of simple and complex lacerations, circumcision, assisted deliveries, and amnioinfusion. A continued strong emphasis on evidence-based medicine includes an ongoing summary of Level A recommendations throughout the text. A new chapter summarizes practical applications of how to incorporate continuous quality improvement and enhanced medical safety into the maternity care setting. A new section details which immunizations can be used safely during pregnancy. A section on "Centering Pregnancy" discusses this new model of care and how it incorporates longitudinal group.

The thoroughly updated Second Edition of this Spiral(R) Manual provides concise, accessible information on the full spectrum of clinical problems in primary care. Written from the family physician's perspective, the book emphasizes ambulatory care, plus pertinent hospital-based and home-based health problems. Throughout all chapters, the focus is on disease prevention and health maintenance.Topics include frequently encountered diagnostic challenges such as amenorrhea and fatigue, management of common disorders such as diabetes mellitus and hypertension, and selected procedures such as obstetric ultrasound and nasolaryngoscopy. This edition includes three new chapters on valvular heart disease, sexual assault, and pain management. LWW/Medcases Case Companion on-line review tool for this title, click http://www.medcases.com/lippincott