Friday Reflection 53: Eradicating the Very Important Patient from the Medical Ecosystem

NT is a 55-year-old man admitted to the general medicine service with cellulitis of his left leg. When the attending sees him the morning after admission, he notices the patient’s “Medical Center Trustee” hospital ID on his bedside table. After gathering a history and examining the leg, the attending leaves the room. In the hallway, he crosses paths with the hospital president, who is there to make a “social call”. She smiles and says to the attending, “Don’t let anything bad happen.”

Every clinician is familiar with the Very Important Patient, the VIP. Defining the VIP is challenging.¹ In the most general sense, the VIP is a patient whose care imposes an additional burden on the clinician. The VIP is perceived to have an elevated social status, typically due to fame, wealth, connections, or power.

The VIP may come to his or her status in several ways. The VIP might claim that status herself. The status might be granted by a third party, such as the source of the referral, or outside realities (fame, fortune, power). Sometimes, VIP status is granted by the physician alone.

The physician recognizes that an untoward outcome in the care of the VIP — clinical or otherwise, expected or unexpected — will be acknowledged by a wider community and might be particularly unpleasant for the treating physician.

VIP patients are a threat to healthcare. They need to be eradicated from hospitals and clinics as ruthlessly as we would eradicate E. coli from a well, Pseudomonas from a hot tub, or Legionella from a hotel HVAC system.

Why should we eliminate the VIP? Because a patient’s wealth, station, or connections should have no bearing on the tests that are done, the treatments that are offered, or the haste with which care is provided.

I have heard people argue about whether basic healthcare is a human right. I have heard people who agree that basic healthcare is a human right argue about what makes up basic healthcare and who should decide what qualifies. I have never heard people argue about whether people deserve different care based on their identity.

The most obvious threat the VIP poses is to himself. We recognize that when people are treated as special, they are at risk of getting worse healthcare. This fact underlies the guidance that physicians avoid caring for close friends and relatives. The AMA Code of Medical Ethics states:

When the patient is an immediate family member, the physician’s personal feelings may unduly influence his or her professional medical judgment. Or the physician may fail to probe sensitive areas when taking the medical history or to perform intimate parts of the physical examination. Physicians may feel obligated to provide care for family members despite feeling uncomfortable doing so. They may also be inclined to treat problems that are beyond their expertise or training.

You could easily replace family member with VIP. While we can all avoid treating family members and close friends, VIPs are a reality in every physician’s life. Transferring their care to another physician usually does not change the circumstances.

Ben Kean, an exceptionally colorful character and my parasitology teacher in medical school, shared a story about the risks VIP healthcare poses to the VIP. He once suggested that a patient with pneumonia — a patient who was also famous, wealthy, and important — be transferred from a private hospital to a public one, and treated under a pseudonym.

"But why a public hospital, when I have a good private clinic here with the best doctors and nurses?"

"There are two ingredients essential to your recovery," I explained, "that can't be found here and that you cannot buy. These are things found only at a large public institution, where hundreds of patients are seen each day, many of whom suffer from pneumonia. First, you need a large house staff -- bright, young people with new ideas and with daily experience in dealing with desperate situations. Second, you need a laboratory with specialized technicians available around the clock to monitor your breathing, to do special culture work for bacteria and parasites. This is a lovely private hospital, but the kind of help you need isn't available here."

Then there is the reality that if you treat VIPs differently, and it becomes known, it is a bad look. Just ask the leadership of NYU Langone Health.

But the threat of the VIP goes beyond personal risk. The overtesting, overtreatment, and early diagnosis that have been described not only threaten the VIP but are also bad for our healthcare system. Overspending and excess erode other people’s care. An unnecessary MRI ordered for the VIP’s week of sciatica may delay the diagnosis of cord compression in the non-VIP with back pain and prostate cancer.

VIP treatment can lead to ill will among members of the healthcare team. Teams bond when they work together for the benefit of a patient. With VIPs, team members most under the patient’s sway may suggest management at odds with that proposed by team members less influenced by the patient’s status. It is not hard to imagine moral injury if a healthcare worker perceives they are acting because of who a patient is rather than because of what the patient needs.

If a team bows to pressure, the ethics of medicine are compromised. Other patients will perceive a tiered system, and this will undermine their faith in medicine.

Eradicating the VIP from healthcare is certainly more difficult than getting rid of E. coli, Pseudomonas, or Legionella. How do we ensure that the homeless man, with no wealth, power, or family, receives the same care as the woman for whom the hospital is named?

It may be hard to eradicate the VIP when healthcare itself has played a significant role in creating the VIP. Hospital marketing and rankings promote the idea that doctors and hospitals are not equal. They do this to attract the “best payer mix” so they can build shiny new facilities. If patients, with their expensive, private insurance, are drawn to a medical center because of the rankings, should we be surprised if they expect something for their money and effort?

I wish there were an easy answer.² There is not. It is possible that Mick and Keith are our best guides here.

As clinicians, we know that we need to provide the best care possible for our patients. We also recognize that different people want different things from their healthcare. Some people just want to be left alone at night, others want an extra cup of tea with breakfast, and others want a visit from the hospital president. If these allowances truly do not affect the care of patients, all patients, then there is no harm in providing the desired care in addition to the necessary care. Once management of the VIP threatens to affect care, hers or that of her fellow patients, then physicians need to recommit to their pledge to care for everyone equally, regardless of who they are. This is at the core of the practice of medicine.

1. NOTE – I tried so hard not to offer the analogy to Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart’s characterization of pornography as, "I know it when I see it." If I’m going to lower myself to use it, I’ll at least give you an interesting history of the quotation.

2. Writing this, I realized I wrote a related essay back in 2023. That essay ends, “Our pledge to care for everyone equally, regardless of who they are, is at the core of the practice of medicine. Like all promises, however, it is a challenge to keep.”

Photo Credit: Zoe Holling