The changing role of the physician.

A physician’s role in health care should be to promote affordable quality care for the patient. The importance of this role was exemplified in the final Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) regulation that repealed the requirement for local hospital boards but – to help offset concerns regarding "the importance of physician input at the governing body level" – inserted a requirement that at least one physician serve on a facility’s hospital board. It was stated that this requirement "will build in an important element of continuity and ensure regular communication between a hospital’s governing body and its medical staff(s)," and that "a physician who specifically represents medical staff members will hold some measure of enhanced standing within the governing body" (Fed. Reg. 42 CFR Parts 482 and 485, vol. 77, May 16, 2012, 29038).