Physician (Sleep And Pulmonary Medicine)

About the role

The W.G.(BILL) Hefner VA Medical Center is seeking a staff physician within the Specialty Care Section. The Physician will operate within Medicine Service under the direction of the Sleep Section Chief and/or the Section Chief of Pulmonary Medicine. The physician is responsible for providing effective delivery of medical care as specified by his/her scope of practice, including but is not limited to Bronchoscopy, Home Oxygen Program, Critical Care, CP AP clinics or Lung Cancer screening program.

Responsibilities

• Participate in administrative work assignments, including program building as assigned
• Provide guidance and support to the nurse practitioners assigned to Medicine Service in their respective areas of expertise
• Participate in and attend medical center committees as assigned
• Participate in various facility programs designed to enhance and improve the delivery of patient care services, such as Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) teams
• Give Medicine Grand Rounds and other lectures for staff education
• Take a sleep and/or pulmonary history and perform physical examination that identifies elements pertinent to sleep and pulmonary diagnoses
• Provide accurate sleep and pulmonary diagnosis for undifferentiated patient symptoms and/or other findings
• Provide long term treatment and monitoring of patients with a broad range of sleep and pulmonary disorders
• Participate in multidisciplinary activities for optimal care with respect to pulmonary and sleep conditions
• Order appropriate sleep and pulmonary testing to diagnose and monitor sleep and pulmonary conditions, respectively
• Integrate patient care activities on Medicine Services and other patient care programs at the medical center and in the community such as Social Work, Prosthetics, Home Based Health Care (HBHC), and private nursing homes
• Demonstrate expertise in diagnosing and treating a broad range of pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine patients
• Demonstrate skill in implementation of clinical practice guidelines and protocols for patients with complex pulmonary and sleep medicine care needs
• Order durable medical equipment therapies routinely used in pulmonary and sleep medicine specialty
• Serve as expert specialist in interpreting pulmonary and sleep tests, including but not limited to home sleep tests, attended in lab sleep studies, pulmonary function tests, and oximetry testing
• Provide pulmonary and sleep care through non face to face encounters, including e-consults, telephone and video clinics
• Provide invasive ventilator management if providing ICU coverage
• Identify excessive daytime sleepiness and initiate a basic evaluation of patients with this complaint
• Diagnose, treat, and manage patients longitudinally with sleep disordered breathing
• Identify patients with sleep disordered breathing who have co-existing sleep disorders and manage appropriately
• Order and interpret laboratory tests within the context of a sleep evaluation
• Prescribe medications used to treat patients with sleep disorders, including but not limited to hypnotics, stimulants, as well as Xyrem and Xywav
• Interpret data from CPAP devices and manage appropriately to optimize efficacy and compliance of the therapy
• Counsel, instruct and educate patients on respective risks, indications and limitations, benefits, complications and proper use of therapy
• Prescribe and manage different PAP modalities as appropriate, including but not limited to auto-CPAP, fixed CPAP, BiPAP, BiPAP ST, ASV, and iVAPs
• Consider and prescribe alternative therapies to CPAP when appropriate, including but not limited to the Inspire device, an oral appliance (mandibular advancement device), and oral surgery