Use of the term provider also creates confusion for patients, who have difficulty determining the role, responsibility, and training of different team members.⁶ A blanket term creates confusion rather than clarity. Indeed, “a ‘provider’ is ambiguously associated with corporate entities, like cell phone or utility providers.” As opposed to “physicians whose sacred relationship with patients warrants a higher degree of dignity.”⁷

As we strive for a more inclusive and respectful health care environment, it is essential that we use language that accurately reflects the roles and contributions of each member of the health care team. For physicians, this means reclaiming the title that signifies their expertise, dedication, responsibility, and trust placed in them by patients. Referring to physicians as providers is indicative of a larger problem: the erosion of the physician’s role as a trusted, knowledgeable, and skilled professional.

Reclaiming the Title

There are many actions that organizations, individuals, and media outlets can take to help reclaim the term doctor. The American Medical Association (AMA), ACEP, and many other professional organizations have already issued policies opposing use of the term provider or other non-specific terms (see sidebar).^8,9 The AMA has gone so far as recommending that physicians “insist on being identified as a physician.”⁸ Other professional organizations can issue similar policies.

Journals and media outlets can update their official style guides to require that physicians be named as such, and the term provider, or other similarly nonspecific language be avoided. As Bray and Walker wrote, “The hijacking by corporate officers of the sacred credentials of eight centuries of physicians is unconscionable and should be opposed in every global communication media.”¹⁰

Electronic medical record and scheduling software can rename components of the record such as the “provider note” or phrases such as “next available provider.” Note templates can change phrases such as “attending provider” to “attending physician.”⁷

Educators can use language thoughtfully. Medical students are not attending provider school, but medical school. Early learners are in a phase of rapid knowledge acquisition and assimilation. They are quick to adopt terms they hear from trusted mentors. Residency and medical school educators can model accurate language and avoid referring to their residents or attendings as providers.

Hospital leaders can change the language used in official documents, contracts, and communications.

Finally, all of us can reflect on the terms we use. The language we choose shapes our identity and future reality. If we continue to use the term provider for physicians, we devalue the profession, and disrespect the effort, time, and sacrifice required to become a physician. We perpetuate microaggressions, and we accelerate the transformation of the physician from expert, leader, and healer to a transactional, dispensable, task-based generator of RVUs.