THE APOCALYPSE (SIGN NUMBER 1)

The Sunday Times Week In Review section contained this nifty letter:

To the Editor:

Thank you for bringing attention to the growing problem of access to primary care in Massachusetts. The problem has been worsened by our universal health care initiative, which was missing a strategy to increase the number of providers to serve the increase in patient load.

Your article, however, focused on increasing the number of doctors to solve the primary care shortage. Nurse practitioners have been filling this role for more than three decades by providing the best in health care.

We are the future of primary care. Make an appointment. We’re open.

Robb Stenson West Falmouth, Mass., April 7, 2008


What universe am I living in? The buffoon can’t be serious! It’s just not possible. Nurse Practitioners are the future of primary care? They are providing the BEST in health care? No one, and I mean NO one in their right mind could believe such a thing. Not even Robb Stenson (and by the way, why the two ‘b’s? Does that stand for BIG BUFFOON??) asks to see an NP OVER a doctor! That’s right! I don’t see any NP hospitals and people clamoring to see NP’s INSTEAD of doctors! They are ANCILLARIES!!! Did they forget that?

It truly makes me just want to give up. Can Internal Medicine be devalued any further? Why do I teach it to med students, when apparently NP’s are the future anyway? And they wonder why students don’t want to pursue a career in IM. Jackasses like Robb Stenson apparently feel they are better than IM doctors and they have a tenth of the training.

I give up. The Apocalypse of Medicine is surely upon us.