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The Washington State Medical Association (WSMA) is a professional organization providing tangible support of medical practice and access to physician services; promoting quality, cost effective care; and being a respected voice in the public arena.
The WSMA is physician driven and patient focused, working to make Washington a better place to practice medicine and to receive care.
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A physician, medical practitioner, medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a professional who practises medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining, or restoring health through the study, diagnosis, prognosis and treatment of disease, injury, and other physical and mental impairments. Physicians may focus their practice on certain disease categories, types of patients, and methods of treatment—known as specialities—or they may assume responsibility for the provision of continuing and comprehensive medical care to individuals, families, and communities—known as general practice. Medical practice properly requires both a detailed knowledge of the academic disciplines, such as anatomy and physiology, underlying diseases and their treatment—the science of medicine—and also a decent competence in its applied practice—the art or craft of medicine.
In the United States, a health maintenance organization (HMO) is a medical insurance group that provides health services for a fixed annual fee. It is an organization that provides or arranges managed care for health insurance, self-funded health care benefit plans, individuals, and other entities, acting as a liaison with health care providers on a prepaid basis. The Health Maintenance Organization Act of 1973 required employers with 25 or more employees to offer federally certified HMO options if the employer offers traditional healthcare options. Unlike traditional indemnity insurance, an HMO covers care rendered by those doctors and other professionals who have agreed by contract to treat patients in accordance with the HMO's guidelines and restrictions in exchange for a steady stream of customers. HMOs cover emergency care regardless of the health care provider's contracted status.
Naturopathy or naturopathic medicine is a form of alternative medicine that employs an array of pseudoscientific practices branded as "natural", "non-invasive", and as promoting "self-healing". The ideology and methods of naturopathy are based on vitalism and folk medicine, rather than evidence-based medicine. Naturopathic practitioners generally recommend against following modern medical practices, including but not limited to medical testing, drugs, vaccinations, and surgery. Instead, naturopathic study and practice rely on unscientific notions, often leading naturopaths to diagnoses and treatments that have no factual merit.
Osteopathy is a type of alternative medicine that emphasizes manual readjustments, myofascial release and other physical manipulation of muscle tissue and bones. Practitioners of osteopathy are referred to as osteopaths. Its name derives from Ancient Greek "bone" (ὀστέον) and "sensitive to" or "responding to" (-πάθεια).
Osteopathic medicine is a branch of the medical profession in the United States. Osteopathic doctors (DOs) can be licensed to practice medicine and surgery in all 50 states and are recognized to varying degrees in 65 other countries.
The American Medical Association (AMA), founded in 1847 and incorporated in 1897, is the largest association of physicians—both MDs and DOs—and medical students in the United States.
A Physician Assistant (PA) is a professional who practices medicine in collaboration or under indirect supervision of a physician, depending on state laws. Physicians do not need to be on-site with PAs and collaboration or supervision often occurs via electronic means when consults are necessary. Their scope of practice varies by jurisdiction and healthcare setting.
The American College of Physicians (ACP) is a national organization of internists, who specialize in the diagnosis, treatment, and care of adults. With 154,000 members, ACP is the largest medical-specialty organization and second-largest physician group in the United States, after the American Medical Association. Its flagship journal, the Annals of Internal Medicine, is considered one of the five top medical journals in the United States and Britain.
Family medicine (FM), formerly family practice (FP), is a medical specialty devoted to comprehensive health care for people of all ages; the specialist is named a family physician or family doctor. In Europe the discipline is often referred to as general practice and a practitioner as a general practice doctor or GP; this name emphasises the holistic nature of this speciality, as well as its roots in the family. Family practice is a division of primary care that provides continuing and comprehensive health care for the individual and family across all ages, genders, diseases, and parts of the body; family physicians are often primary care physicians. It is based on knowledge of the patient in the context of the family and the community, emphasizing disease prevention and health promotion. According to the World Organization of Family Doctors (WONCA), the aim of family medicine is to provide personal, comprehensive, and continuing care for the individual in the context of the family and the community. The issues of values underlying this practice are usually known as primary care ethics.
Urgent care is a category of walk-in clinic focused on the delivery of ambulatory care in a dedicated medical facility outside of a traditional emergency department. Urgent care centers primarily treat injuries or illnesses requiring immediate care, but not serious enough to require an emergency department (ED) visit. Urgent care centers are distinguished from similar ambulatory healthcare centers such as emergency departments and convenient care clinics by their scope of conditions treated and available facilities on-site.
In the United States, anesthesia can be administered by physician anesthesiologists, anesthesiologist assistants or nurse anesthetists
The medical home, also known as the patient-centered medical home (PCMH), is a team-based health care delivery model led by a health care provider to provide comprehensive and continuous medical care to patients with a goal to obtain maximal health outcomes. It is described in the "Joint Principles" as "an approach to providing comprehensive primary care for children, youth and adults."
In the United States, physicians may hold either the Doctor of Medicine degree (MD) or the Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine degree (DO). MD and DO physicians complete similar residency programs in hospitals, can be licensed in all 50 states, and have rights and responsibilities common to physicians.
Participation of medical professionals in American executions is a controversial topic, due to its moral and legal implications. The practice is proscribed by the American Medical Association, as defined in its Code of Medical Ethics. The American Society of Anesthesiologists endorses this position, stating that lethal injections "can never conform to the science, art and practice of anesthesiology".
Clinical peer review, also known as medical peer review is the process by which health care professionals, including those in nursing and pharmacy, evaluate each other's clinical performance. A discipline-specific process may be referenced accordingly.
Minnesota Medical Association (MMA) is a non-profit professional association representing physicians, residents, and medical students, working together for a healthy Minnesota. With 10,000 members, the MMA is an advocate on health care issues at the State Capitol and in Washington D.C. It provides a connection between physicians and lawmakers through a variety of events at the State Capitol and in legislator's home districts.
Kevin Pho is an American physician of internal medicine, media comentator, public speaker, and author. He is the founder and editor of KevinMD.com, a website aimed at medical professionals.
An anesthesiologist assistant is an advanced non-physician provider who provides anesthesia under the medical direction of a physician anesthesiologist. In the United States, such providers are termed certified anesthesiologist assistants or CAAs and are known professionally as anesthetists or anesthesia assistants.
DaVita Medical Group is an American managed care provider that operates practices in California, Colorado, Florida, Nevada, New Mexico and Washington. The company is a subsidiary of DaVita Inc. with approximately 74,500 employees and serves more than 1,700,000 patients. DaVita Medical Group operates several different subsidiaries, in California, it operates as HealthCare Partners, in Colorado it operates as DaVita Medical Group and Mountain View Medical Group, in Nevada it operates as HealthCare Partners and WellHealth Quality Care, in Washington it operates as The Everett Clinic, and in Florida and New Mexico it operates under its flagship name, DaVita Medical Group.
A collaborative practice agreement (CPA) is a legal document in the United States that establishes a legal relationship between clinical pharmacists and collaborating physicians that allows for pharmacists to participate in collaborative drug therapy management (CDTM).