Why do audiologists not try to increase their scope of practice to be similar to that of an optometrist (i.e. the ability to diagnose and treat some medical issues and prescribe limited medications in addition to the usual things)? This would free up time on the ENTs to conduct surgery and treat advanced disorders/disease while also increasing the salary for audiologists. In essence, why doesn't the aud/ent relationship become comparable to the optometrist/opthamologist relationship?
more scope of practice
- Thread starter audperson
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As of right now, doctors of audiology have not been able to obtain limited physician status or gain such recognition federally. In addition to that, the issue of direct access has also been a hindrance for AuDs to have much control over seeing patients with Medicare or Medicaid; however, there may be some changes in the near future depending on what the new government healthcare laws. In other words, those individuals with Medicare are required to get a physician's referral before they can see us. Even then, you probably will not get fully reimbursed from Medicare for the services you billed. And from my understanding, even though national organizations such as ASHA or AAA have already defined the scope of practice for audiologists in their policies, not all states cover everything on it under their licensure. If you provide a service not listed under your audiology state license, you are susceptible to a malpractice lawsuit. So as you can see, there are still many hurdles for audiologists to overcome, before we can expand the scope of practice even further. But do not worry, there are people within our field that are voicing out to politicians in Washington. As student doctors and current doctors of audiology, we can also contribute to this profession's growth through various means such as spreading awareness, and hopefully, one day we'll one day be acknowledged by the government and all health professionals as primary hearing/balance providers.
audballer, thank you for your reply! Do you or anyone else know how to go about lobbying to have the legislation passed that would allow audiologists to gain limited physician status? It doesn't seem that there is a very strong lobbying body for audiology (from what I can tell). Also, is there anything being done to address the seemingly lack of unity among the field of audiology so as to establish a strong lobbying body for direct access and such, and to begin to demand salaries comparable to other doctoring healthcare fields? The reason I ask these questions is because I see audiology as a very interesting field with great potential and have submitted applications to various aud programs; however, I am worried that I will be undertaking great debt without any hope of ever being able to pay it back or have a comfortable living comparable to other healthcare professionals. I realize that money isn't everything but I would like to reap the rewards of all the hard work that goes into it and not come out wondering why I didnt go into a different healthcare field. Hopefully 4-6 yrs from now all of this will at least be starting to get ironed out.
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What exactly is it that you want to do? Place ear tubes? Script meds for otitis?
I've got no problem with patients seeing you directly without referral for hearing evaluations/hearing aids but you got no business doing medications or surgery.
audperson, I do know there are various individuals and organizations out there who are advocating for these changes to happen; however, I've only heard my professors mentioned it briefly at school. I'll get back to you on that after I get more details from them.
As of right now, I can only perceive audiologists as diagnosticians and rehab clinicians. I don't think we're ready for prescribing medications unless the AuD curriculum pushes for it nationally. The pharmacology course itself is also not as in depth enough for clinicians like us to make such judgment calls. However, we are expanding into intraoperative monitoring for surgeries, and I think that's pretty good progress. But yeah, I do not think we're medically trained enough for that kind of task as of now.
As of right now, I can only perceive audiologists as diagnosticians and rehab clinicians. I don't think we're ready for prescribing medications unless the AuD curriculum pushes for it nationally. The pharmacology course itself is also not as in depth enough for clinicians like us to make such judgment calls. However, we are expanding into intraoperative monitoring for surgeries, and I think that's pretty good progress. But yeah, I do not think we're medically trained enough for that kind of task as of now.
Thanks for the reply, I'm not advocating for anything in particular, I was just inquiring as to why audiologists aren't trained to treat minor things such as swimmers ear, minor earache, etc. . It just seems to me that the field as a whole would benefit by modelling itself to be similar in practice to optometry.
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I have a little more perspective on audiologists being able to write scripts like optometry. Yes I think audiologists should be able to write scripts for things such as otitis media and minor allergies. Do I think we should be allowed to do any further prescriptions? NO.
I have a background in nursing as well as audiology. I actually toyed with the idea of going back to nursing school to become a family nurse practitioner to work with a large ENT group. I could basically function as an audiologist but also do a lot of the routine stuff that ENT's do and physician assistants do and free up time for ENT's to handle more important and tougher cases.
I took pharmacology courses in undergrad.
I took 2 courses in my RN education (I did not finish my RN due to an awesome job offer and some life changes)
In graduate school for my FNP I would have taken 2 more pharmacology courses.
That's 4 courses in pharmacology. I would have been able to write a vast amount of prescriptions for various medications with having those 4 courses as a nurse practitioner.
I think we could make it possible for audiologists to have the education and training required to provide very basic antibiotics for things such as otitis media, otitis externa, etc. and this could be easily done in the 4 year programs we have.
Physicians and nurse practitioners will never let it happen though. Many physicians are still angry that nurse practitioners are now able to perform many of the duties physicians can perform with about half the training. I can see their reasoning. I mean I still get angry that someone with a GED can sell hearing aids and give hearing exams like I do. Medical assistants have far less training than I do in healthcare and do far more in terms of patient care in an ENT office than the audiologist is able to do.
We have a lot of hurdles to overcome in our field. If you love hearing aids and the rehab side then you would like Audiology. It is a very rewarding career, but yes the money could be and should be better. That will eventually change, but it's going to take a long time and a hard fight. If you want to prescribe medications and still counsel patients then you should look into an accelerated nurse practitioner program. Many exist where if you have a bachelor's in a related field for healthcare then you take a 3 year full time program and become a nurse practitioner. Nurse practitioners make almost double what a typical audiologist makes working for a healthcare institution.
I have a background in nursing as well as audiology. I actually toyed with the idea of going back to nursing school to become a family nurse practitioner to work with a large ENT group. I could basically function as an audiologist but also do a lot of the routine stuff that ENT's do and physician assistants do and free up time for ENT's to handle more important and tougher cases.
I took pharmacology courses in undergrad.
I took 2 courses in my RN education (I did not finish my RN due to an awesome job offer and some life changes)
In graduate school for my FNP I would have taken 2 more pharmacology courses.
That's 4 courses in pharmacology. I would have been able to write a vast amount of prescriptions for various medications with having those 4 courses as a nurse practitioner.
I think we could make it possible for audiologists to have the education and training required to provide very basic antibiotics for things such as otitis media, otitis externa, etc. and this could be easily done in the 4 year programs we have.
Physicians and nurse practitioners will never let it happen though. Many physicians are still angry that nurse practitioners are now able to perform many of the duties physicians can perform with about half the training. I can see their reasoning. I mean I still get angry that someone with a GED can sell hearing aids and give hearing exams like I do. Medical assistants have far less training than I do in healthcare and do far more in terms of patient care in an ENT office than the audiologist is able to do.
We have a lot of hurdles to overcome in our field. If you love hearing aids and the rehab side then you would like Audiology. It is a very rewarding career, but yes the money could be and should be better. That will eventually change, but it's going to take a long time and a hard fight. If you want to prescribe medications and still counsel patients then you should look into an accelerated nurse practitioner program. Many exist where if you have a bachelor's in a related field for healthcare then you take a 3 year full time program and become a nurse practitioner. Nurse practitioners make almost double what a typical audiologist makes working for a healthcare institution.
