Bill Hethcock Staff Writer-Dallas Business Journal
Irving-based Merritt Hawkins’ new 2013 Survey of Physician Inpatient/Outpatient Revenue puts a price tag on what physicians are worth to hospitals based on their specialties.
Orthopedic surgeons top the list at $2.7 million per year, while the overall annual average for the 18 specialties surveyed is $1.4 million.
The finding that grabbed me is that for the first time in the survey’s 11-year history, primary care physicians exceeded specialists in average annual revenue generated. The 2013 survey shows family physicians generate $2.1 million annually for their affiliated hospitals, up from $1.7 million in 2010, the last time the survey was conducted.
Phil Miller, vice president of communications for Merritt Hawkins, told me this afternoon that the survey shows a shift in power from specialists to primary care physicians under the national health reforms that set up primary docs to “quarterback” where patients are referred.As a result, hospitals are employing more primary care doctors.
“In the past where primary care doctors might have sent an X-ray patient to the radiology group down the street, as a hospital employee, they may be more likely to send them to the hospital that employs them,” Miller said.
Miller referred to it as the power of the pen.
“These numbers have always been a key insight into health care economics,” Miller said. “It’s really the doctor that drives much of health care spending.”
The survey by the national physician search firm asked hospital chief financial officers to quantify how much revenue physicians in 18 specialties generated for the hospital in the last year.
