Hospitalist Growth in the U.S.

In 2018, nearly three fourths of newly certified general internists — recently completing training and not going on to fellowship — practiced as hospitalists, whereas only 13% practiced as outpatient-only physicians (NEJM JW Gen Med Jul 1 2022 and Ann Intern Med 2022; 175:1022). To estimate the growth and size of the hospitalist specialty in the U.S., investigators used Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) inpatient billing codes (acute inpatient, observation, and critical care) to identify the number of practicing adult hospitalist physicians (i.e., those with ≥90% of their CMS billing for inpatient) in the U.S. from 2012 to 2019.

In 2012, hospitalist physicians numbered just under 30,000; that number grew to more than 44,000 in 2019, wh…