Week 9-1 Discussion Post 21 Document

In a healthcare setting, deprofessionalization decreases the knowledge or skills of a single

profession and breaks it into multiple professions (Science direct, 2021). An example of

deprofessionalization in a healthcare setting is breaking a medical physician into a

secondary unit called a medical assistant. Another example of deprofessionalization is a

laboratory technologist job broken into units called laboratory technician and laboratory

assistant. These secondary units would not eliminate the original healthcare profession.

Healthcare organizations will continue using deprofessionalization in the industry. With

the staffing shortage is on the rise, the healthcare industry believes that creating secondary

units of a profession would make more people work for a certain position without

medical treatment from a medical assistant or a technician, they do not believe that they

are receiving the proper care that they should be receiving.

Deprofessionalization' is the idea that there is a shift from professional to nonprofessional

status and the decreasing distance between doctors and patients with knowledge and

education, generally in reference to the rise of consumerism in healthcare (Coburn 2001).

Although there is a shift in medical power deprofessionalization in healthcare is generally

used when discussing in medical knowledge. The managed care expansion in healthcare is

consumers, and the deprofessionalization of medicine also took a turn (Kaufman 2011).

This change also brought about a change in the doctor-patient relationship and the

hindrance to the medical professional’s ability to perform their jobs as before. It seems

that the managed care companies seem to be part of the deprofessionalization in that they

are sort of pulling the strings on healthcare and limited both patients and doctors (Marlow

1997). Physicians acquire their knowledge and subsequent access to evidence-based

practice information that is grounded in science to provide them power, autonomy, and

wealth all things associated with professionalism. Physicians are losing their power as the

healthcare industry continues to shift to one of corporate management and profit-making.

These changes takeaway the physician’s ability to be "altruistic servants" specifically with

incentives to reduce treatments for money, the loss of camaraderie and cohesive health

off mundane work life and burnout and decrease the sense of powerlessness.

professionals are limited by managed care and patients. Their power and knowledge is

diminished and stunted by the current structure to healthcare. With the potential for a

universal healthcare in the not-too-distant future it would be interesting to see how

professionalism responds to the changes. If physicians might be able to obtain and

improve on their sense of power, autonomy, and professionalism.

"Deprofessionalization refers to the decreasing distance, in knowledge or education,

between doctors and patients or the rise of consumerism generally" (Haug, 1975).

Medicine is now becoming another exchange of goods and services (Smith, 2016). Many

times, in the profession, providers are required by law to go against their personal beliefs,

morals, and values to accommodate the people of their facility. This term symbolizes roles

of customers instead of patients. An example would be a patient requesting an act of

euthanasia because they no longer want to live life and the provider has to abode by the

patient's wishes, not what they feel is best for the patient (Smith, 2016). As we continue in

medicine, deprofessionalization will continue at an even more rapid pace because it

requirements that individuals must obtain prior to practicing in the industry. This can be

done by offering different third-party certifications rather than solely government-imposed

certifications. These certifications, according to Svorny and Cannon, “would allow

innovative educational and certification programs, nontraditional career paths, incremental

expansion of clinician skills and scopes of practice, and the creation of new categories of

health care professionals. The result would be better career opportunities for clinicians and

greater access to care for patients.” (Svorny & Cannon, para. 3, 2020). While different

responsibilities are taken away from certified practitioners, one can argue that they were

overqualified to be doing such menial tasks anyway. With deprofessionalization, tasks

such as drawing blood can be passed on to individuals who are right-skilled to draw blood.

This frees up the practitioner to focus their resources onto more important tasks.

Not only do resources become better allocated, deprofessionalization creates more

keeping prices low and the quality and choice of goods and services high.” (FTC, para. 3).

It is hard to say if this approach will be ever taken in this country. Personally, I like the

idea and believe that the healthcare system would benefit drastically from

deprofessionalization. Epstein proposes one argument discussing the topic of medical

professionals becoming obsolete. He writes; “The threat to the professional stature of

physicians became more direct now that management skills and technical prowess

progressed to the point where it made it possible to standardize other tasks which were

traditionally reserved for the professional judgment of senior medical personnel” (Epstein,

difficult to see them letting this happen. There are many hurdles that must be taken prior to

deprofessionalization becoming a reality!

Deprofessionalization includes the rationalization of knowledge, the rationalization of task

which employ knowledge, and the growth of various tools to assist in applying knowledge.

more knowledge-based tools can be applied. An example of this theory applied to health

care is the registered nurse (RN) position. The RN is always going to be needed in

healthcare and even more so during the current shortage. “They assess and identify