Job Marker Future AKA Future Job Market

[pathstudent]

What do you think will be the trend for pathology jobs? There are multiple things to consider.

Future will be worse:
1. Consolidation of Clin Path and to an extent anatomic is viewed favorably by hospital administration.
2. Bundled payments and a move away from Fee For Service will likely reduce specimens as docs will be more critical about test utilization (both clinical and anatomic)

Future will be better:
3. America is fat and getting old. More disease means more specimens.
4. As American embraces Quality of Care over Quantity of Care, increased funding for primary care trainees and loss of specialty trainees will result in fewer pathology residents.

I think 1 and 2 will outweigh 3 and 4, but that is just my guess for now.

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[yaah]

1 and 2 are already happening. That doesn't mean the future will be worse though. It may mean there will be fewer pathologists needed.

I tend to think the trend is towards a future with fewer pathologists needed because each can do more. The bigger questions are
1)what newer types of testing will develop and how pathology will be involved. That's also the bigger unknown.
2) How do pathologists get paid? If everything is bundled how does money get distributed and who distributes it? The primary cares? Hospitals? Physician groups? Insurance companies? Regardless of who does it do the physician specialties that take more of the pie now continue to take more of the pie?

 

[Over9000]

Might as well kiss clin path goodbye. That's the future and I don't see it changing. Consolidation and automation with cheap PhD scientists running the show is going to be the new normal.

CAP's lobby in Washington tries to get residency spots expanded. I don't think pathology's getting cut any time soon.

AP is going to be more challenging. The lumping in of AP with the rest of lab makes it seem to admins that the same automation can occur with it. However they fail to realize the interpretive subjective assessment that is the usual course of business with practicing AP. Nevertheless, hanging out with the wrong crowd makes you guilty by association - our "lab"ness will be enough for admins to cut our slice of the pie as small as it can possibly get, and for some things there will be no pie leftover. We're the last in the pay chain with bundled payments, and we'll be the ones eating the crumbs unless we provide arguments as to why it is a bad idea for patients.

 

[yaah]

Clin path will not go away if pathologists become more involved in lab utilization either for hospitals or for primary care groups. Pathologists are well positioned to create rules, algorithms, etc for test utilization. But if you delegate this or leave it to other fields, then yes, clin path will go away.

 

[Over9000]

Clin path will not go away if pathologists become more involved in lab utilization either for hospitals or for primary care groups. Pathologists are well positioned to create rules, algorithms, etc for test utilization. But if you delegate this or leave it to other fields, then yes, clin path will go away.

I think it will still go away, mainly because of three related truths: 1. clin path is technically, perhaps even legally, not the practice of medicine and because of that, non-physicians can take control of it, which is a very likely outcome because of fact number 2: PhDs are far cheaper and 3. Clin path can easily be consolidated due to economies of scale. All three are a recipe for the removal of clin path from the hands of physicians, which in my opinion is just fine.

 

[yaah]

Um, yes it is the practice of medicine. Maybe parts aren't, but most is.