One solution may be encouraging often-reluctant primary care providers to take on bigger leadership roles in healthcare, the report authors suggest.
Currently, such providers are often the most overlooked and underrepresented in healthcare leadership, but their fears of potentially losing autonomy by taking on more of a leadership role could be seen as an opportunity for them to craft their own job descriptions and roles, according to the report.
“Executives and health administrators can tap into this motivation by framing leadership as a constructive opportunity to be a change agent,” the report said.
Administrators can provide cross-training opportunities for primary care providers and allow them to have access to mentors to help them with such a transition.
Primary care physicians are the “swiss army knives of medicine” and can offer an increasingly rare generalist perspective, according to the article.
“Without a highly functioning and sustainable primary care system, all health care in the U.S. will suffer,” the authors conclude. “If we want a system that promotes effective and sustainable primary care, PCPs need to be involved in co-designing that system and leading change.”
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