IMO one particularly good point just made is that most clinicians have patients as clients, and market themselves accordingly, while pathologists have clinicians as clients. This puts pathology in a relatively unique position. We basically work for clinicians, and generally encourage ourselves to be treated accordingly. The same pros & cons patients look at to decide what clinician to go to don't apply. Sure, at some point you get what you pay for, but we're still faced with trying to accomodate the whims of clinicians rather than necessarily follow best practice procedures. Or even allow clinicians to define -our- best practice, particularly things like turnaround time, anything having to do with screening tests or frozen sections, stains, send outs, etc.
I don't know what the best solution is for that, whether it's taking tissue out ourselves (still have to be referred by a clinician), hiring our own clinicians to work for -us- instead of the other way around, becoming more aggressively involved in clinical discussions/debates & research, or what. But I do think it's a very relevant point, and part of what defines the common pathology business model.
For raider's #3 & #4, I confess some agreement. Teaching the business/administration of pathology is kinda lip service thus far, little more than the basics of billing and a few of the required lab procedures, standards, and statistics. And if we're going to require MOC, presumably to support universal maintenance of basic competence, why Why WHY not apply it universally? I understand the oldies who probably voted it in didn't want to do it, but...so what? Irks me to no end.
