Center to Advance Palliative Care

Those numbers seem reasonable in comparison to our program which has actually been running since mid-2007. I regard my position as an 0.5 FTE though we are in northern California and my stipend as medical director is considerably less than 0.5 but I do bill and collect for my services directly. (California, with certain exceptions, does not allow hospitals to hire physicians for medical services directly - a point which is often confusing when dealing with national figures and national models.)
We do not yet have an 0.5 NP but are just in the works to recruit one. Our bed numbers are similar to yours but spread between two hospitals in two communities 10 miles apart. We even have two hospitalist programs - both operating in each hospital. One is hospital aligned and one is "independent." Independent some would translate as "anti-hospital" though that might be a little strong. One of the indepedent hospitalist group is my biggest referral source while her partner in the smaller hospital is the rarest source. We have two oncologist who seldom use me until it's late and then more often for hospice set up.(I am also director of our hospice program to further confuse things.)
I believe there is a great, as yet untapped source of referrals in the outpatient and nursing home population. I initially envisioned a program that would transition across this continuum but then I realized - there's only one of me! That is why we will be looking for an NP to help tap other arenas.
We feel our "net worth" is better demonstrated by specific cases (rather than "numbers") of transfer out of the ICU, withdrawal of life support,conversion to DNR, etc. But our board and administration I realize is different than your board and administration.
Someone once said: "If you've seen one palliative care program, you've seen ONE palliative care program!" because they all tend to be unique. As time goes on that seems to remain true. Our team is going to a PCLC followup program at UCSF next week and I am very curious what we will learn since our initial visit in Oct. 2006. Good luck to your program!