For each of the following scenarios, describe the type of conflict that is being represented by the particular scenario being described.
(a) Hadley Primary Care Group in Johnson, Vermont has been in the community for 35 years. The senior partner in the group is a member of the hospital Medical Executive Committee. The 10-member primary care group is the major source of primary care in the community of 10 thousand people although there are a few other primary care providers in solo practice offices. A new hospital administrator was recently hired to assume responsibility for the organization. He announced to the physicians that he hired a physician search firm to recruit five family practitioners that would be employed by the hospital. He justified the decision by saying that increasingly hospitals were employing their own doctors and the community was experiencing a significant population growth with retirees. Dr. Wetzman from Hadley Primary Care expressed his dissatisfaction to no avail and said he would discuss it with his primary care partnership and if necessary bring it to the hospital Board of Trustees.
(b) After reading of the new advances in virtual visits, the administrator of Stoughton Memorial Hospital proposes to his medical staff that it might be worthwhile to consider initiating a similar effort with a reintermediation strategy. The administrator says she has contacted TelaDoc, company that has partnered with several other hospitals to provide 24/7 virtual visit services. The CEO then shows several similar-sized hospitals web pages where the hospitals virtual visits offering using TelDoc are promoted. At this point the medical staff meeting is in an uproar. Several doctors say that they will lose business or else will lose referrals.
(c) Austin Orthopedics is one of the largest orthopedic groups in Southwestern Oklahoma. After many years of admitting to Tulsa General Hospital, the physician group decide that it might just be better for them in terms of operating room efficiency and their own patient satisfaction if they take a major leap in investment and market positioning to build their own free-standing outpatient surgical suites. In recent years, the vast majority of their own surgeries have required few overnight stays in a hospital. The hospital, upon learning of these plans, decides that it might be best for them to go to the AAOS, hold an internal meeting of orthopedic surgeons, and mount an aggressive campaign to recruit their own orthopedic surgeons into the community.
