The University of Chicago, Section of Hospital Medicine provides 24 hour a day in-house clinical care at The University of Chicago Medicine (UCM) to an array of medically complex patients served through a number of collaborative, specialized services.  These unique interdisciplinary models are described in detail below.

Clinical Services

Solid Tumor Hospitalist Service

The Solid Tumor Hospitalist Service is a collaborative service involving the Section of Hospital Medicine, the Section of Hematology Oncology at UCMC and the Palliative Care Team at UCMC. The service provides inpatient care of oncology patients with solid tumors, multiple myeloma and lymphoma.

The service has developed and implemented a collaborative, multi-disciplinary rounding approach.  This unique, collaborative model improves the quality of comprehensive medical decision making in this complex and vulnerable patient population.

The service has led multiple initiatives to improve the care of hospitalized oncology patients including: improved interdisciplinary rounds, standardized pathways for management of febrile neutropenia and malignant bowel obstruction and facilitation of appropriate and timely follow up with outpatient oncology and palliative care.  The Solid Tumor Hospitalist Service is devoted to providing safe, compassionate, patient-centered care to our oncology patients.

Liver and Transplant Service

The Hospital Medicine Liver Transplant Service and Lung and Kidney Transplant Service are hospital medicine co-management services staffed by Physician (MD) and Nurse Practitioner/Physician Assistant (NP/PA) hospitalists. The hospitalists co-manage patients with transplant hepatologists, pulmonologists and nephrologists.  This comprehensive and collaborative approach facilitates quality care for this extremely complex and vulnerable population.  University of Chicago Medicine is a leader in the field of transplant medicine and has performed multiple triple organ transplants.  The Section of Hospital Medicine is dedicated to delivering the highest quality care to University of Chicago’s transplant patient population.

Physician Assistant/Nurse Practitioner (PA/NP) Services

The University of Chicago Medicine Hospital Medicine NP/PA team is a recognized leader in advanced practice medicine. The team has a staffing model of seven advanced practice providers specialized in the treatment of hospitalized adult patients. The Section of Hospital Medicine prides itself in an advanced practice model that promotes NP/PA providers working at the top of their scope of practice clinically and professionally.  NP/PA providers serve as first contact providers on both general medicine and transplant (liver, kidney, lung) services and have the support of a collaborating attending physician.  NP and PA providers new to UCM undergo a novel standardized and graduated onboarding process to ensure that they meet the service’s rigorous clinical practice standards.  In addition to providing outstanding clinical care, the Hospitalist NP/PA team continues to propel the NP/PA profession forward with team members occupying core clinical leadership roles in the section and nationally in the Society of Hospital Medicine.  Members of the team spearhead a robust Physician Assistant clinical training site here at UCM which collaborates with multiple Physician Assistant schools and gives early career NP, PA and MD hospitalists an opportunity to teach  This program has been nationally recognized for its novel and effective pivot to virtual education and rotations during COVID-19, allowing learners the opportunity to continue their education when many programs had to pause.

Triage

The mission of the hospital medicine triage service is to provide exemplary and efficient care by getting the right patient to the right service at the right time. 

The medicine triage service at UCM is a 24 hours a day, 7 days a week service dedicated to timely and appropriate assignment of patients to inpatient medicine services. This is an attending only service staffed and managed by the Section of Hospital Medicine The triage attending and triages all medicine admission and transfer requests from the ER, transfer center, outpatient providers, and other inpatient services.  The triage attending reviews and discusses these cases with the appropriate personnel, and determines the appropriate disposition and service for that patient.  Services covered by medicine triage include: house-staff and hospitalist cardiology, house-staff and hospitalist solid tumor oncology, house-staff and hospitalist general medicine, hospitalist liver, hospitalist renal and lung transplant, hospitalist Comprehensive Care Physician program (CCP), and APN-short stay units. The triage service develops and maintains ongoing, collaborative projects to improve the direct admission process, outside hospital transfer process, and geographic concentration of hospitalist patients.

Night Service

The Hospital Medicine Night Service consists primarily of hospitalist attendings, some general medicine residents, fellows and hospitalist Advanced Practice Providers. The night service manages approximately 150 patients with 5 providers, from 7:30pm to 7:30 am. The night providers are responsible for cross coverage of hospitalist general medicine, oncology, cardiology and transplant patients as well as advanced practice provider chemotherapy and bone marrow transplant services. They also have admitting responsibilities and provide Dr. Cart coverage . The fifth night provider covers the

The Hospital Medicine Night Service has developed multiple initiatives to improve the quality of care delivered overnight including implementation of standardized clinical order sets and note templates.