Physician scheduling glossary

• ACGME duty hours

  ACGME duty hours are the work limits for residents and fellows in US accredited programs: 80 hours a week averaged over four weeks, plus rest rules.

• Backup call (jeopardy call)

  Backup call, or jeopardy call, keeps a second clinician available to step in when the scheduled one cannot work or the workload exceeds one person.

• Block schedule (hospitalist 7-on/7-off)

  A block schedule assigns clinicians runs of consecutive shifts, such as the hospitalist pattern of seven days on followed by seven days off.

• Call schedule

  A call schedule assigns which physician covers a service outside regular hours, on nights, weekends and holidays, in the hospital or from home.

• FTE (full-time equivalent)

  FTE (full-time equivalent) expresses a clinician's working time as a fraction of a full-time position, such as 1.0, 0.8 or 0.5 FTE.

• Home call vs in-house call

  In-house call means staying in the hospital for the whole call period; home call means staying reachable from home and coming in when needed.

• Locum tenens

  Locum tenens physicians are temporary clinicians who cover for absent colleagues or fill vacancies, usually as independent contractors.

• Night float

  Night float is a schedule in which a resident or physician works a run of consecutive night shifts, covering patients handed over by the day teams.

• PRN / per diem

  PRN (pro re nata, as needed) and per diem staff have no fixed schedule and work shifts when the organization needs them and they are available.

• RVU (relative value unit) in scheduling

  An RVU is the unit Medicare uses to value a physician service; RVU-based scheduling uses expected work RVUs to balance workload across a group.

• Schedule fairness (equity counters)

  Schedule fairness means sharing nights, weekends, holidays and call in line with each clinician's FTE, measured with counters over a full year.

• Self-scheduling and preference requests

  Self-scheduling lets clinicians pick their own shifts within rules; preference requests let them ask for days on or off before the schedule is built.

• Shift swap

  A shift swap is an exchange of assigned shifts or call between two clinicians, usually approved by a scheduler so that coverage and rules still hold.

• Swing shift

  A swing shift bridges the day and night shifts, usually starting in the afternoon and ending late in the evening, to cover peak admissions or volume.

• Teleradiology coverage across time zones

  Teleradiology coverage assigns remote radiologists to read for client hospitals, often in other time zones, so every contracted hour has a reader.

Building a call schedule? Start with the physician call schedule guide and its free Excel template.