I agree actually with all the points mentioned above despite that there seems to be some points made to counter each other.
If you're a practicing doctor, minding your own business for the most part, you will have little if any impact on the actual NP policies in your state. In that regard, the NPs you're working with, just treat them like any other clinician with regard to their skill.
On a legislative level, well, ahem, that is different. For example, if someone wanted to propose a bill to give NPs full practicing power on the same order as a physician, heck I'd be against it. Not out of some desire to protect my turf, but because I don't think a NP can do everything a doctor can.
NPs can fulfill a needed niche in the healthcare field. I'm all for them in that niche, outside of it, I'd be willing to put up a debate but that really needs to go on a level above what goes on in the day-to-day clinical stuff that most doctors are in. Such debate should be more focused on state legislation and administrative policies.
And what if your wife wants a nurse midwife providing her care?
Several women would rather have an NP or something with less training than a doctor such as a doula handle or at least provide advice on care. My wife had a doula.
And guess what? That doula was excellent and was willing to teach my wife all the BS that happens with physicians and patients such as the often practiced norm of a doctor really trying to direct the care in the manner easier for the doctor than really having the patient be the real decision maker and the doctor in the role of advisor. Several doctors practice on an unannounced pretense that everything should be up to them despite that it's firmly established in legal and medical ethics that it's really the patient that's supposed to have the say, and we're just supposed to give them the options and let them decide.
The doula did things such as give recommendations to my wife on which Ob-Gyns appeared to share similar philosophies with her on how she wanted her birth done, prep on the birthing day, and several things that docs just really don't do because it's not cost-effective for them.
A typical doctor's visit (and let's just all admit this really happens, and in fact may even be the norm) is docs see patients for a few minutes, write a script, and then have that patient removed from the room or they go to the next room. The doula filled the role of explaining to my wife everything that was really going on in layman's terms. Something a doc is supposed to do but often times does not.
(which brings me to my idea that a doctor could do a documentary, go into doctor's offices with a camera, record the meeting and I'd bet you the majority of docs wouldn't even fulfill the minimal legal required practices such as instead of simply telling the patient what to do, offer the options, the risks and benefits of the options and alternatives, and answer the patients' questions even if it required an answer of more than 3 minutes).
