Whether they work in an office, hospital, or healthcare facility, physicians rely on nurses to ensure that they can give the best patient care possible. This is especially important now that there’s an ongoing physician shortage in the US. In fact, by 2025, we’ll be 46,000 to 90,000 physicians short. It certainly doesn’t help that by the same year, the demand for physicians will grow by at least 17% due to the growth in population. As such, physicians tend to handle more tasks to make up for the lack of people.

Fortunately, great nurses can help make their lives a little easier. Here’s how:

They provide much-needed assistance
It’s no secret that physicians don’t have enough time to accommodate all their patients — that’s why they have trusted nurses to help with some of their tasks. For instance, a clinical nurse can update the medical profile of every patient (such as their weight) while they wait for the doctor to see them in. With updated information on hand, the attending physician can conduct faster check-ups.

This situation is much the same in hospitals. Nurses’ help is especially prevalent in overcrowded departments like the ED. It certainly doesn’t help how the more patients that are admitted into the ED at a time, the more medical attention all the other patients need. Fortunately, as one of the top careers in nursing, more BSN graduates are choosing to go into critical care. Critical care nurses handle a lot of tasks, from redressing wounds to administering medication, but their primary role is to monitor patients and report any changes to the attending physician. Cardiac nurses, RN anesthetist, and other nursing roles provide similar assistive roles.

They serve as the connection between physician and patient

Nurses spend more time with patients than their doctors, so they tend to form closer connections with them. True enough, our research on the topic shows that nurses can better fulfill the human connection part of patient care. Therefore, it’s no surprise that patients are more willing to engage in small talk with their nurses. Incidentally, great nurses know how to use this opportunity to uncover important health information, especially those that patients are not willing to tell their physician. Nurses are also more than equipped to answer basic patient inquiries like how a procedure is done. This lets physicians focus on the more clinical parts of the procedure.

They can help with administrative tasks

Nurses aren’t just well versed in patient care, they can also handle administrative tasks like scheduling physician appointments and organizing the flow of payments. Of course, there are different nurse types that are best suited for each task. For example, a nurse case manager is a type of registered nurse that’s in charge of updating and revising patient healthcare plans. This includes getting in contact with the patient’s insurance provider. Since they hold all the data, nurse case managers are also pivotal in estimating the patient’s recovery period. There are also nurse informaticists. These are the people who store your patients’ electronic health records and pull them out upon request. Some clinical nurses also help in administrative tasks.

The best nurses can fulfill different roles, from informatics to pediatrics that can make a physician’s job easier. But because of the specialized nature of some of these fields, it’s important to assess if your nurses are up to the tasks.