St. Luke's adds Pediatric Hospitalist program
August 22, 2008
Earlier this month, St. Luke’s Hospital rolled out its Pediatric Hospitalist program. Led by James Matsuda, MD, PhD, the program provides evidence-based, best practice care for the community’s children. In addition to Matsuda, there will be another full-time and a part-time hospitalist.
For two years, St. Luke’s has had a hospitalist program for adults and now joins a handful of other hospitals across the state adding pediatric hospitalists.
“There is data showing that a hospitalist will decrease a patient’s length of stay and those patients have better overall outcomes,” said Matsuda. “For example, the patient readmission rates are usually lower and using a hospitalist allows office based doctors to be more productive in their clinic.”
Matsuda graduated from the University of Iowa’s MD/PhD program, completed his residency at the University of Hawaii, was a partner at St. Luke’s Cedar Rapids Pediatrics for five years and just recently completed a three-year fellowship at the University of Iowa in pediatric critical care. He will serve as medical director for the Pediatric Hospitalist program and St. Luke’s Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (ICU).
“My training at the University it will help me care for critically ill children because I am familiar with all of the pediatric sub-specialists and will be able to consult with them. Overall, thanks to immunizations and other preventative care measures, the number of children we are seeing admitted to the hospital is going down. However, the ones we are seeing are a lot sicker, more complex and need someone who dedicated their careers to managing these types of patients.”
With the St. Luke’s Pediatric Hospitalist program, patients will get care virtually round-the-clock from someone who is up-to-date on inpatient pediatric medicine.
“I see this program as a big advantage to St. Luke’s patients,” said Matsuda. “The pediatric hospitalist will be at the hospital all day to write orders, manage the patient and constantly evaluate whether the patient’s health has improved enough to be discharged.”
Tools are in place to communicate with the child’s pediatrician or family doctor during the hospital stay and at discharge to ensure a smooth transition.
“We want to alleviate fears for the family,” said Matsuda. “We want them to know that I am in constant contact with their child’s physician and letting them know what is going on. This is best for everyone and maintains the continuity of care.”
