Overview:

Piedmont Healthcare is one of Atlanta’s largest healthcare systems with more than 5,000 medical professionals on staff, eight hospitals, and roughly $2.9 billion in revenue. Led by its flagship facility, Piedmont Atlanta Hospital is a 488-bed acute tertiary care facility specializing in heart health, transplant services, and cancer care. 

The Challenge:

In 2011, Piedmont Healthcare worked with several staffing agencies, but they still had difficulty finding the clinicians they needed. Additionally, across agencies, there were inconsistent procedures, rising costs, and a cumbersome hiring process—all of which affected patient care.

“My primary motivation was standardizing processes and frankly, making my work easier,” recalls Kelly Hulsey, MSN, BSN, RN, CCRN, who was Piedmont’s staffing director at the time.

The Solution:

Then, in 2012, Kelly and her team chose Medical Solutions Plus, a leading managed service provider, to help manage its contingent workforce. Medical Solutions Plus quickly stepped in to help Piedmont with a variety of administrative tasks, such as recruitment, credentialing, onboarding, orientation, and timekeeping. The MSP also handled all staffing agency communication, which included creating one standardized contract and consolidating all agency billing to one invoice.

According to Kelly, Medical Solutions Plus more than delivered.

“I could not be more pleased with the quality of staff provided to us by our MSP,” says Kelly. “The same goes for customer service. It has exceeded my expectations in almost every way.” 

The Result:

With a more streamlined process in place, the healthcare system gained efficiency, reduced costs, and enhanced the level of patient care by finding ideal contingent clinicians. To date, the MSP has improved the hospital system's fill rates to more than 95%, enhanced its contract completion rates to 89%, and hired a dozen Travelers as permanent employees.

Moreover, Medical Solutions Plus protected Piedmont’s reputation when the team discovered and corrected approximately 50 Joint Commission violations in the initial audit. Later on, Medical Solutions Plus also provided additional contingent staff during Piedmont’s transition to an EMR system. By successfully addressing these challenges, Medical Solutions Plus built a relationship of mutual trust and respect with Piedmont’s staff.

“Medical Solutions has truly partnered with Piedmont Healthcare,” says Kelly. “They are so much more than a vendor. Our client representative anticipates our needs, facilitates movement of staff between facilities whenever possible to decrease orientation costs, and helps us make a seamless conversion when we have a Traveler who’s the perfect fit to go permanent.” 

 

Overview:

For more than a century, Dameron Hospital has been providing quality healthcare to the residents of San Joaquin County, California. The non-profit community hospital is a recognized regional leader in the areas of Cardiology and Cardiac Surgery, Orthopedics, Bariatric Surgery, General Acute Care, and Emergency and Intensive Care Services.

The Challenge:

Two years ago, Senior Director of Nursing Support Services Dianna Goodwin, MSN RN-BC spent most of her day searching for qualified nursing candidates. Her hospital had used a VMS; however, coordinating the hiring process was still time-consuming.

“I had to look at candidate profiles and weed out the qualified ones myself,” says Dianna. “Then, I had to send the qualified profiles to different directors and coordinate interviews. Sometimes, I would handle more than 15 phone calls a day. It was all on me.”

To complicate matters, Dianna couldn’t always rely on the VMS to quickly produce quality candidates. The software was also difficult to use, especially when trying to upload or view a Travel Nurse’s credentials. In 2015, she began working with Medical Solutions to help her bridge the staffing gap.

“Medical Solutions provided qualified applicants in a timely manner,” recalls Dianna. “At one point, we had more Travel Nurses from Medical Solutions than we did from the VMS.”

The Solution:

Dianna knew her workload wasn’t sustainable, so she started searching for a solution.

“I knew there were other options out there, so I started the process of looking at companies that offered an MSP solution,” says Dianna.

That’s when Medical Solutions’ Client Manager Pamela Collins suggested her company’s managed service provider, Medical Solutions Plus. Pamela knew that the MSP could help Dameron rapidly find quality candidates, streamline its workforce processes, and help mitigate its risk of hiring temporary staff.

“At the end of the day, Medical Solutions Plus showed us they could perform for us,” says Dianna.

The Result:

For Dianna, the switch to Medical Solutions Plus has been life-changing.

“Medical Solutions Plus has worked with me to develop processes that have made my job easier,” Dianna says. “I no longer have to comb through all that information, set up interviews, or handle multiple phone calls. Now, I can focus on my staff’s needs and other major projects.”

In addition, Medical Solutions Plus also handles Dameron’s credential management to ensure each Travel Nurse meets compliance and regulatory standards.

“With MSP, I can find complete Traveler documentation myself,” says Dianna. “It’s all in one place—I don’t have to worry about it. Now, when the Joint Commission comes to visit, I have faith that it’s all correct and done before they get here.” 

 

Overview:

UPMC Susquehanna is a premier hospital system dedicated to serving the communities of Williamsport and Wellsboro in Pennsylvania. The healthcare system, which includes four hospitals and various off-site clinics, has 342 licensed acute beds, 22 bassinets, 31 licensed psychiatric beds, and 258 skilled nursing beds. UPMC Susquehanna has a national reputation for delivering quality patient care — its Williamsport Regional Medical Center has consistently earned a grade “A” for patient safety from Leapfrog’s Hospital Safety Grade.

The Challenge:

In October 2016, Susquehanna Health joined forces with the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) to become UPMC Susquehanna. While the acquisition allowed the hospital system to expand its health care services, it also meant they needed to ramp up their ability to hire experienced clinical staff.

Prior to the expansion, UPMC Susquehanna relied on Medical Solutions and another staffing agency to fulfill its temporary staffing needs, but it wasn’t always ideal.

“We were working with two companies to bring in candidates,” says Jessica Segraves, director of human resources at UPMC Susquehanna. “The processes were different which made it confusing for our team and the nursing teams.”

The Solution:

Medical Solutions Senior Client Manager Darrel Reichenberg, who was cognizant of UPMC Susquehanna's intricate hiring process, recommended his company’s managed service provider to Jessica. Known as Medical Solutions Plus, the MSP offered UPMC Susquehanna customizable and affordable workforce solutions to fit their specific needs. Since then, the hospital’s human resources team has never looked back.

“Medical Solutions Plus has become part of our staffing plan, and Darrel has done a great job at making sure his services are meeting our unique needs,” says Jessica. “He has always made us a priority.”

The Result:

With Medical Solutions Plus as its strategic staffing partner, UPMC Susquehanna reduced its administrative complexity.

“Medical Solutions Plus is a one-stop shop!” says Jessica. “We no longer need to work with multiple staffing vendors, varying processes, and different expectations. We’ve always received a great number of candidates.”

For UPMC Susquehanna, the decision to partner with Medical Solutions Plus had additional advantages as well. Thanks to MSP’s web-based software platform, Jessica’s team could also centralize all staffing activity throughout the hospital system, which allowed them to better predict future staffing needs. Moreover, the facility’s bill rates remained the same after the transition to Medical Solutions Plus. All these benefits resulted in major cost-saving measures and an overall better patient experience.

“We have been able to minimize overtime hours for our staff which impacts our bottom line and enhances our employee engagement,” says Jessica.  “It also has a great impact on patient satisfaction.”

Overview:

The Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula (CHOMP) has served the people of Monterey and its surrounding communities since 1934. Nationally recognized for its clinical excellence, the non-profit 205-bed healthcare facility is committed to providing safe, quality patient care. It recently earned the coveted grade “A” in patient safety from the Leapfrog Group. Additionally, the community hospital has consistently earned high employee engagement scores in its annual employee survey.

The Challenge:

For years, Valerie Warren, CHOMP’s senior administrative assistant in the human resources department, coordinated the hospital’s contingent workforce on her own. It wasn’t always an easy task.

“We had 23 different contracts before Medical Solutions Plus, so I got multiple phone calls all day long from various staffing agencies,” says Valerie. “The process was time-consuming and cumbersome.”

As a result of the fragmented hiring process, CHOMP frequently missed opportunities to secure quality candidates. In addition, the human resources department also found it difficult to track the necessary compliance requirements needed with a contingent workforce of more than 60 Travelers.

The Solution:

CHOMP was already a longtime Hospital Client of Medical Solutions. So Valerie and the CHOMP leadership team elected to use the staffing company’s managed service provider, known as Medical Solutions Plus, to help streamline the facility’s contingent workforce processes.

In particular, the managed service provider’s web-based technology platform appealed to CHOMP’s leadership team.

“The MSP Portal really stood out to us,” says Valerie. “It’s great to have all our compliance documents in one place, easily accessible, and up-to-date.”

The user-friendly software allows CHOMP’s human resources team to easily track compliance standards with complete and accurate clinician profiles, contract start and end dates, Traveler headcounts, and customizable financial reports.

“Medical Solutions Plus knows us well, and they know our compliance requirements,” says Valerie.

In fact, the MSP team’s personalized service and attention to detail impressed Valerie from the beginning of the partnership.

“They came out to meet us in person and they took the time to understand our needs,” says Valerie. “It made a huge difference.”

The Result:

With the help of Medical Solutions Plus, the Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula has reduced its administrative complexity, saved hours of staff time, and improved its credential management.

“Thanks to Medical Solutions Plus, the number of phone calls I get has been greatly reduced,” says Valerie. “It’s also nice to have just one point of contact, with one contract and one invoice.”

Valerie added that her MSP Client Manager, Pamela Collins, has gone above and beyond in the name of customer service.

“Pam will interact directly with our Unit Managers which frees up time for me to focus on other projects,” says Valerie.

 

 

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