Characteristics of the ideal hospitalist inpatient care program: perceptions of Canadian health system leaders

BACKGROUND: Despite the growing prevalence of hospitalist programs in Canada, it is not clear what program features are deemed desirable by administrative and medical leaders who oversee them. We aimed to understand perceptions of a wide range of healthcare administrators and frontline providers about the implementation and necessary characteristics of a hospitalist service. METHODS: We conducted semi-structured interviews with a range of administrators, medical leaders and frontline providers across three hospital sites operated by an integrated health system in British Columbia, Canada. RESULTS: Most interviewees identified the hospitalist model as the ideal inpatient care service line, but identified a number of challenges. Interviewees identified the necessary features of an ideal hospitalist service to include considerations for program design, care and non-clinical processes, and alignment between workload and physician staffing. They also identified continuity of care as an important challenge, and underlined the importance of communication as an important enabler of implementation of a new hospitalist service. CONCLUSIONS: Most hospital administrators and frontline providers in our study believed the hospitalist model resulted in improvements in clinical processes and work environment.