When I use a word . . . Introducing hospitalists

Hospes in Latin means both a host and a guest. It’s a Janus word that reflects a reciprocal arrangement between not so much opposites as counterparts. Hospes gives us the word hospitality, which is what a guest would expect from a host. It also gives us the words hospice and hospital. Although the word “hospitalist” had been used occasionally to mean someone who ran a hospice or a hospital, it had been long obsolete when it was reintroduced in the USA in the late 20th century to describe a general in-house doctor in a hospital responsible for providing complete care for patients with general medical problems, no matter what organ or system was affected. Early reports of the outcomes of instituting hospitalist programmes were generally positive. The Re:State think tank, in a recent report on the UK hospital of the future, has suggested introducing hospitalists here, in order to reduce the problems of internal and external bottlenecks that restrict the flow of patients through and out of the hospital. We therefore have the opportunity to institute a pilot scheme whereby the benefit to harm balance of introducing hospitalists into UK hospitals would be studied, with a view to introducing them widely if the scheme proved to be successful.