Physician Group
What is a physician group?
A physician group refers to one or more physicians operating as an organization to provide care. These can be classified as either private practices, in which a solo physician owns and manages their own office, or group practices or provider groups where two or more physicians administer care within the same facility.
Group practices can be categorized as either single- or multi-specialty, depending on the type of care that each physician provides. Single-specialty provider groups offer one type of care, like internal medicine or optometry. Group health physicians in a multi-specialty practice combine their expertise to offer many different types of care all within the same facility.
Why are physician groups important for healthcare?
Physician group practices are important because they can serve many different patients’ needs within the community. Multi-specialty physician groups offer one convenient place where patients can go to receive many different types of care.
Physician group providers are also likely to have regularly scheduled check-ins with their patients, which gives them an opportunity to help maintain and improve population health within their respective communities.
There are also other medical practice types, such as employed physician practices, which are owned and managed by hospitals, or independent contractors. Providers regarded as “locum tenens” typically offer temporary coverage of different clinical needs when another physician is absent. These positions are usually contract-based and managed through a recruiting firm.