My privileges were negotiated before I got here. And my taking the position was contingent on my having these privileges. But studies show that family physicians deliver 20 percent of America's babies, and research shows that mothers and infants who have C-sections performed by family physicians can experience excellent clinical outcomes compared to standard measures of surgical care. They are told they can have privileges if they've done some impossibly high number of C-sections. But these numbers don't prove skill.
Some physicians are better at acquiring skills than others.
The OB-Gyns are trying to set the stick at a different height for FPs to jump over. Eric Runte, M.D., a California family physician, has taken his fight for obstetrics privileges to the federal courts. In 1996, Runte filed an antitrust lawsuit against Sonora Community Hospital and three OB-Gyns. Runte directs the Primary Care Clinic at Tuolumne General Hospital in Sonora. Because this hospital doesn't have a birth center, he delivers babies at Sonora Community Hospital.