A good nurse is hard to find, unless you know where to look. With a national shortage of nurses and a growing number of open positions for RNs and other allied healthcare professionals occurring simultaneously, qualified nurses are in high demand, but scarce supply.
If your organization needs to hire nurses — fast — but doesn’t want to spend extra human power on the search for those elusive healthcare professionals, turning to a traditional healthcare staffing agency may seem like an easy answer. However, the cost of outsourcing your nurse recruiting efforts may in the long run far outweigh the benefits.
The Challenges of Working with a Traditional Nurse Staffing Agency
They’re slow. Nurse staffing agencies move at a snail’s pace. From verifying the credentials of their client base, to connecting a nurse to an open position at a healthcare facility, outdated and inefficient methodologies mean that healthcare institutions might wait three to twelve months to hire a nurse through a staffing agency. In one study, only 5% of surveyed hospitals said that they felt they were able to hire quality candidates in a timely manner.
There is already a lot of pressure placed on active nursing teams, and an untimely vacancy or care emergency can be extremely detrimental to an institution’s operations. It is critical for both hospitals and outpatient facilities to fill open nursing positions as quickly as possible in order to maintain a high quality of patient care.
They’re expensive. The nurse shortage means that staffing agencies can charge exorbitantly for access to a limited pool of qualified RNs and LVNs. An external talent source may price its services between 12% and 50% of an employee’s hourly wage. For example, if an institution hires a per-diem nurse through a staffing agency at $26 per hour, a hospital or outpatient facility will owe $13 to the agency per hour worked by the nurse. A 13-week per-diem employee working 12 hour shifts in this scenario might cost an organization $42,588, with a third of these expenses going to staffers.
Vacancies themselves are a financial burden on healthcare institutions. Staffing those open nursing positions may cost even more if they are not filled quickly and efficiently: up to $7,645 at larger organizations. Some hospitals report that they spend $30,000 filling leadership roles. And that’s without incorporating a go-between entity in the hiring process.
Nurse Staffing agencies are not healthcare organizations. While there are many healthcare-specific staffing agencies in operation, not all of them are fully versed in the intricacies of medical ethics, credentials, or the legal aspects and implications of nursing.
Background checks, credential verification, and other screening measures are typically performed by the agency upon their acquisition of job-seeking nurses. Improper screening performed by the staffing agency can have dire consequences for a hiring organization, and directly affect patient care if any oversights are made during this process.
Fortunately, other talent sourcing options exist in this modern age of medicine. Working with Medely, a contemporary staffing solution, can save your hospital or outpatient facility time and money, without sacrificing the quality of your hires.
Why Choose Medely
Medely is made by medical professionals. We know what you need, because we’ve been there. Medely started as an idea to address staffing shortages through technological interventions, creating a more cost-effective and transparent hiring solution for medical institutions.
Not only that, but all of our screening and vetting processes are performed by registered nurses. This includes and in-depth background check which incorporates a social security number trace, a nationwide criminal search, a county court records search, a federal criminal search, as well as an OIG search. And additionally unit assessments which verify both clinical experience and personality fit for the specific needs of the job.
Medely is cost-effective. Organizations can sign up for free at Medely.com and not pay anything for services until the job is booked and completed. Our flat-rate pricing allows you to save 40% or more compared to the expenditure of hiring a staffing agency. Payments and insurance are also handled through the Medely platform, eliminating the costs associated with internal handling.
Medely is modern. Medely allows hospitals and outpatient care facilities alike to skip the middleman and connect directly to thousands of qualified nursing candidates and other allied professionals through an online platform. Once you post a job, the Medely solution automatically matches the specific requirements of the position with an active best-fit and highly skilled healthcare professional. This cuts the hiring process down to minutes, rather than months.
Once a job is in progress, employers can access a candidate’s credentials and background checks through the web-based portal. You can additionally track active jobs in real time, and payments and time tracking are automated, saving your organization both time and labor.
Final Thoughts: Challenges of Working with Nurse Staffing Agencies
Staffing agencies can prove to be more of a hindrance than a help when sourcing qualified per-diem healthcare professionals. Solutions made by medical professionals for medical professionals such as Medely offer methods which saves facilities time and energy, and bolsters quality of patient care.
Medely is a nurse staffing platform that finds qualified travel and per-diem nurses for your hospital or outpatient facility as soon as you need them. To find out how Medely can be an asset to your organization, sign up here for free.