Advanced practice providers are projected to make up 50% of the employed clinician workforce nationwide by 2033, Britney Broyhill, DNP, ACNP-BC, vice president of advanced practice for the North Carolina and Georgia division at Charlotte, N.C.-based Advocate Health, said in an episode of Becker’s “Clinical Leadership Podcast.” In her division, APPs already make up around 46% of clinicians. In Advocate’s Wisconsin-Illinois division, they make up about 40%.
Becker’s has identified 27 hospitals and health systems with a chief APP or equivalent executive, most appointed between 2024 and 2026.
“When health system executives invest in advanced practice leadership, they’re not just investing in a profession,” Rhonda Hoyer, MSN, RN, APNP, vice president of advanced practice for the Wisconsin and Illinois divisions at Advocate Health, said. “It’s about investing in access, in an effective and efficient team-based care model, in innovative ways to deliver care and in what our future clinical workforce is evolving to be, which is all about the team. […] For leaders who are thinking about this, the question is whether their organizations are intentionally leading that work or simply reacting to it.”
Having someone who represents APPs at the C-suite level is vital for the workforce, Dr. Broyhill said. Without a chief APP, leadership teams miss a key member of the team in decision-making, a key perspective on how care gets delivered and a person accountable for the APP workforce. Folding APP leadership into physician or nursing leadership can leave gaps in information, because APP leaders can interpret the same data through a different lens than nurses or physicians, she said.
Without that APP leader, health systems and hospitals can risk missing “the full strategic potential of the workforce,” Ms. Hoyer said. “By not having that unique leader lens, we’re missing opportunities for our patients and our teams. There’s a real case to be made around workforce growth, strategy and leveraging the full potential of the care teams we’ve talked about going into the future.”
