DCLS degree candidate writes post responding to SDN thread

[pathperson]

Here is the DCLS degree candidate response to my post here on SDN. WOW! I had no idea I was worthy of such fame in the blogosphere! And for the record, I have never written to this individual on her blog, or communicated with her, or done anything like that. So I do not know where that is coming from to say that she "knows who I am," and where I practice and what comments I have left on her blog and other silliness. Perhaps there is more than one pathologist who thinks the DCLS is an unnecessary degree?

This, Too, Shall Pass

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[LADoc00]

Here is the DCLS degree candidate response to my post here on SDN. WOW! I had no idea I was worthy of such fame in the blogosphere! And for the record, I have never written to this individual on her blog, or communicated with her, or done anything like that. So I do not know where that is coming from to say that she "knows who I am," and where I practice and what comments I have left on her blog and other silliness. Perhaps there is more than one pathologist who thinks the DCLS is an unnecessary degree?

This, Too, Shall Pass

Okay Im confused what is hell is the point of this degree? Is it like a PhD in Med Micro? Is it a path to being a Admin Lab Director??

Because literally by law, only a physician with board certification can medically direct a lab and I pretty much never see that changing anymore than I see physician extenders performing surgery solo....

Plus..isnt this degree just lab equipment? AUTOMATED lab equipment? Like soon to be robotically AI enhanced non-human lab equipment? Like machines? Like a doctorate in machines? Better than basketweaving Im sure, but still not a medical degree....

The irony is the trend towards LESS clinical lab certification: more worker bee med tech unlicensed folks feeding large automated clinical lab analyzer banks. Already labs are outsourcing most CLS jobs completely, tomorrow there will be maybe 1-2 CLS jobs in massive automated wherehouse type operations. Think Tom Cruise's character in Oblivion, 2 people tending massive AI controlled lab systems....

 

[pathperson]

There are NPs who can practice medicine (diagnose patients and determine treatment,order and intrepret labs) with zero physician oversight of any kind in 24 states. I *believe* this includes some NPs/PAs who can perform circumspection and vasectomy. So yes, there are midlevels who can do surgery. And yes, if they take one of the many "certifying exams" allowed following this degree, they can be LMD of a high-complexity lab.

I thought CLIA states you do not have to be a physician to be LMD. You can be PHD.

 

[LADoc00]

Dunno about other states but CA you cant be a PhD only director of a medical lab (perhaps vet lab?), you have to be a BOARDED pathologist (so BE doesnt count). It is a buried somewhere in CA Business and Professional Codes, but its in there somewhere as I looked it up during one of my last inspections. Also losing your board cert status would also make you ineligible to direct a med lab, which is why I looked it up I think...cant remember atm.

But regardless, what would be the point?!

Let's say a hospital pays 200K to a pathology group to medically direct the lab. That's 200K to a NON employee 1099MISC contractor.

Now they hire a Doctorate in something something to be the medical director because state law allows it. You would have to pay him or her like 120K or less to save ANY money whatsoever because benefits and payroll tax add another 50%+ to the bottom line. At 120K, a salaried employee is costing them then 180000 per year AND the hospital would still have to figure out how to cover the lab in cases of illness and vacation making the realized cost MORE than the 200K they were the pathology group.

And 200K to the pathology group is a TON, lots of groups get way way less than 200 per hospital.

AND as the CEO of the hospital you still have to figure out how to cover the Anatomic and likely now pay separately for call for frozen sections etc.

This a financial mess that will result in a NET LOSS of $$, it doesnt make sense. Literally doesnt make sense. Even paying more than $250,0000 per year to a pathology group to do the medical directorship tasks as a contractor arrangement is far better than employing someone to do ONLY that.

This doctorate in lab sciences would have to pay LESS than a typical CLS where I am to make any sense financially now that I think about it. Bonkers.

Did anyone actually sit down with a piece of scratch paper and write this out before they created the doctorate program or is this some kind of educational scam that seem to be everywhere now, like a for profit shenanigans type thing??