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Join Patrick Dotts, a health care executive. We’ll delve into the pressing challenges faced by the health care workforce, including high turnover rates and low employee satisfaction. Patrick will share insights on how health care organizations can leverage staffing partners to overcome these hurdles. Discover how staffing partners customize their approaches, maintain extensive candidate networks, and streamline hiring processes. Learn how they help minimize disruptions in health care operations and ensure the continuity of patient care.

Patrick Dotts is a health care executive.

He discusses the KevinMD article, “Efficient staffing partners for health systems.”

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Transcript

Kevin Pho: Hi, and welcome to the show. Subscribe at KevinMD.com/podcast, and get CME for this episode by clicking on the CME link in the show notes. Today we welcome Patrick Dotts. He’s a health care executive. Today’s KevinMD article is “Efficient staffing partners for health systems.” Patrick, welcome to the show.

Patrick Dotts: Thanks, Kevin, happy to be here, excited to talk to you today.

Kevin Pho: So let’s start by briefly sharing your story and journey.

Patrick Dotts: Yeah. So I’ve been with the company Soliant for a little over 12 years now. We’re based out of Atlanta, Georgia. I’m originally from Ohio, and I met my wife in Ohio but she’s originally from Georgia, and so we moved down here.

And a little over 12 years ago I stumbled upon a friend of hers who referred me to the company. And to be quite honest with you, didn’t know a whole lot about health care staffing when I started. When I went to school I was a sport management major with a minor in entrepreneurship.

And so really, when I arrived at Soliant and I learned a little bit more about what we did here, we were a relatively small company. And so over that time, I started off in a recruiter role and also working as a sales executive with our hospital clients. I started to learn a little bit more about the business side of staffing, and over that time I moved from a sales role into a leadership role. And as of today, I help lead an organization of over 150 colleagues who help staff and partner with clinicians and hospital providers all over the country.

Kevin Pho: All right, so in your KevinMD article, “Efficient staffing partners for health systems,” we’re going to talk about that in a little bit. But we always hear about health care staffing challenges, it’s always in the news, and as a physician myself I see it every day. Just from your perspective, give us the context of some of the staffing challenges that we’re facing in health care today.

Patrick Dotts: Yeah. And I think obviously COVID has created a much larger spotlight on the staffing challenges, but really this is an age-old problem, as you know.

Even going back to, you think about when the ACA was implemented, back in around 2012, you really saw this demand start to explode, in terms of, you had more people coming online in terms of insurance, but yet our supply has never been able to keep up with that growing demand.

We’ve got an aging population, a population that isn’t getting any healthier. So you’ve got, again, this is all pre-COVID, you’ve got this demand that continues to outpace the number of people we can put into schools. Affordability of school is an issue. The number of people able to teach in the schools is an issue, to get more allied professionals, nursing professionals, doctors.

And so you’ve had these systemic supply side and demand side issues even pre-COVID, and then COVID just exacerbated those issues. And we see it all over the country, whether it’s a hospital provider, a local clinic, a cancer center, an imaging center. There’s not a single business that’s tied to health care that doesn’t run into these issues.

And although the COVID pandemic sort of demand has contracted and we’re in a little bit more of an equilibrium, it’s worse than it ever was. And I even read an article this morning that nearly half of all health care workers plan on leaving their career field in the next year. I think the number was about 46 percent, but that was an SIA cited number. And that’s a little scary, as somebody who’s the father of two children, and the idea of going to a hospital and being short staffed. And so that’s just the systemic problem we have on our hands.

Kevin Pho: Now, we hear a lot about the numbers in terms of how stark the shortages are, but for those people who are listening to you here, tell us the impact that has on patients. Are there any anecdotes or stories about how some of these staffing challenges can directly impact patients?

Patrick Dotts: If you’ve ever had to visit an emergency room, everybody probably has their own story.

Recently my son broke his arm, and thankfully it was a situation where he wasn’t life-threatening by any means, and it was painful, but it was a Sunday afternoon in the fall here in Atlanta. We went to one of the children’s hospital ERs, and there’s 110 patients in the waiting room, and they only have one orthopedic team able to perform any sort of procedures. And we were in that hospital for a broken arm, to get reset and cast, for eight hours. And that’s a five-year-old kid who you’re looking at and wondering, when is he going to get the help he needs?

And I think, luckily in our scenario it’s not life-threatening. But we hear stories from our nurses on assignment, or allied professionals on assignment, of just the sheer volume of patients that they have to see. And we know, when we have more patients, when that patient ratio gets too high, it can put lives at risk. And it can cause burnout with our clinicians. And at the very best, it creates a scenario where patients are just unsatisfied with the care they get, but the worst is obviously a patient’s life, depending on the severity of the issue. And we hear that time and time again from our consultants out in the field.

Kevin Pho: And the problem isn’t just the fact that there’s a supply side issue, there’s also a turnover issue as well, is that correct?

Patrick Dotts: Yeah, that’s right. If you really look at workforce participation over the years, especially over COVID, we saw a lot of female based employees, not just in health care, across the industry, leave the workforce. And in health care, where it’s disproportionately more female, we saw that as well.

And we’re also talking about working conditions and work environments where they’re short staffed on leadership as well. And if you don’t have great leaders, you don’t have great programs in place, it creates dissatisfaction with employees. When they’re overworked and having to work mandatory overtime, you’re going to burn your staff out. And then on top of that, you’re dealing with stressed out patients, depending on where you’re working.

You’ve got to think about turnover in a couple different buckets. One is internal turnover. One of our large hospital providers that we partner with was talking about this, where they have a lot of internal turnover, where somebody may be working in ER, med surg, or ICU and then move to a different role that’s maybe nonpatient facing within the organization, whether that’s leadership or management. But that leaves a gap back at the bedside.

And then there’s external turnover, where they either leave and go to another hospital system. But what you’re seeing more is they’re leaving the hospitals and going to more non-hospital based positions. I’ve got a neighbor who works across the street who used to be a NICU nurse, who now works for a company that specializes in doing blood draws and inserting, doing IVs for people who are dehydrated, or also what they call personalized medicine for athletes.

And so you have that turnover, but then there’s the turnover of people just leaving the industry altogether. And that’s our biggest issue, because those folks are just completely vacating the workforce and health care. And that’s probably the largest issue that we have in play here. And turnover just creates instability with our clients and with our patients.

Kevin Pho: And for these staffing challenges, are you seeing that across the health care spectrum, whether it’s a small community hospital or a large academic medical center?

Patrick Dotts: Yeah, there’s not a single hospital that isn’t dealing with this issue in some manner.

The large hospitals have more resources, they’ve got more efficiencies that allow them to put more programs into place, whether it’s their own internal contracting, or working with multiple providers, or running an MSP through there, or having a designated float pool.

Where these more rural hospitals really struggle is, although the volume of need is lower, filling in those gaps is much more difficult. We help those hard to fill openings for more of the rural hospitals, because although they only may need a handful of travelers at a time, or contractors, or even perm staff, they do not have the resources, the knowledge, bandwidth to be able to fill those openings.

Kevin Pho: All right, so in your KevinMD article you talk about some of the approaches to solve some of these issues. So talk more about that.

Patrick Dotts: Yeah. I think a lot of our hospital clients, especially if they’re new to the administration role that they’re in, or maybe they’re the manager over a department that’s never used travelers before, they don’t understand how staffing companies are designed and work. And there’s no staffing company that’s exactly the same.

And I think traditional staffing models, I think of these brick and mortar local, I’m going to find you somebody down the road to come walk in the door. And the reality is, there’s companies that specialize in more of that local per diem fashion, there’s companies that specialize in the travel nursing world, there’s companies that specialize in the travel allied world, and then there’s some companies that are just focused on specific areas within the hospital. For example, there are some companies that all they do is surgical services, or imaging.

And what you want to do is understand, what are your needs, how many vendors can you really work with to fulfill all those needs? Because if you work with somebody who’s sort of a catchall and doesn’t really specialize, you may not get the unique skill set in the timely manner that you need.

If you run a unique cancer center program where you need somebody with specific equipment experience, certain background, whether it’s in proton therapy or any sort of specialized approach, sometimes it’s better to partner with somebody who’s got a lot of depth in that arena. And finding that right partner takes time, you kind of have to do your research. But typically what you’ll find is, when you work with companies that are more specialized, you’ll get a quicker turnaround, but also candidates that fit exactly what you’re looking for, not just from an experience standpoint but culturally as well.

Staffing companies like to build a depth to their staffing in terms of experience, because they know that a first-time traveler, while they may have the skill set, maybe they don’t know the ins and outs of walking into a new hospital first time and it’s only for 13 weeks. And so finding people who are specialized and have that depth is really important.

And then there will be companies where you need to work with them to help you build a per diem pool. You really have to look at it as, what are my needs, and then what are the vendors that could help me fulfill those needs the best? And so I think that really will help you build an expansive network, but also help you build one that’s specialized for you.

Kevin Pho: So tell us a success story where you partnered with a specific medical institution and really moved the needle and helped some of their staffing challenges.

Patrick Dotts: Yeah. And I’ll try to keep the hospital anonymous here, but there’s a large level one teaching facility in the Southeast that we work with closely over the years. And one of the things that they really struggle to do is bring on new heart programs.

And so when they want to build up their ability to do cath lab procedures, that’s an area where we really specialize. We understand that a non-invasive procedure like cath and IR is preferred, not just for the patient but for the hospital as well.

But the idea of going out and finding, not just the surgeon who can do that, you’ve got to get the techs, you’ve got to get the nurses, you’ve got to get everybody to help support that. And when you’re launching a new program, that takes a staffing partner really to help you, you’ve got to get somebody behind that. So that’s a hospital where we’ve consistently supplemented and helped them create stability within their heart program.

Kevin Pho: Now, in terms of other options, if an institution chose not to partner with a staffing company, what other options do they have to fill some of these gaps?

Patrick Dotts: Yeah. I think if you’re going to go the route of not using an expert outside your facility, you’ve got to take a long hard look at what are the true costs if we try to do this internally.

And I think money is obviously a big driver for a lot of professionals, but money only goes so far in terms of attracting talent. You’ve got to have an internal staff. If you really want to build out a robust program internally, you’ve got to build out a staff that knows how to go out, find candidates, attract talent, and then keep them in your workforce.

And the reality is, when you look at the cost of doing programs like that, sometimes it makes sense to have that and still have a staffing partner. Because the staffing partner is going to cover a lot of the cost that you’re really not thinking about as administration, whether it comes from recruitment to contracts to legal liability, the medical benefits, and payroll. All of those things are something that we provide, and credentialing. The cost of getting somebody going on assignment keeps going up and up and up, because whether it’s because they have to keep up with their certifications or their medical records, these are all things that you have to consider when you’re trying to beef up your own internal program.

It is an option, but I would think of it as a multipronged approach of, I’ve got my own internal staff, that’s the first approach. I want to build out an extensive float pool network that we control. We’ll try to do some contracting labor ourselves. But even through all that, even our largest clients with the most resources still have to use partners like us. It is just the reality of doing business right now. And so we really encourage our clients to do all four of those things.

Kevin Pho: Now, as a physician, I certainly have had some experience dealing with a variety of support staff and nurses, and especially during the pandemic they would come from all parts of the country and come to our institution. Tell us the process of sourcing your traveler, per diem staff, and how do you maintain a network of people ready to go?

Patrick Dotts: Yeah. The number one thing that our company has on our side is, we’ve got 32 years of experience, a robust database, and extremely good SEO. And so we really try to have a strong web presence, on social media, on job boards, all those things to get people attracted to us.

And I think that’s another thing, when you think about a hospital and their capabilities in terms of being able to spend those marketing dollars to attract talent in the door, that’s just not something that they’re able to budget in, or really have experts in. And we’ve got 32 years of expertise in that arena, and so we get a lot of candidates that seek that through us.

But our number one way of getting candidates is referrals. And simply meaning, when we get a candidate who goes on assignment with us, we want to treat them the way they should be treated, which is, they’re out there patient facing, they’re the ones making life better for the patients and the families out there. We want to treat them in a way that makes them say, when somebody wants to travel or be a contractor, I’m going to refer them. That’s still our best quality, and our number one source is our referral network.

But when somebody approaches us for the first time, we do our own internal interview. We want to make sure, one, that their needs are something that we’re going to be able to help them with. Two, that their skill set is going to be able to be transferable into a travel contract, something where they can get into a hospital and hit the ground running. So we want to see what type of experience they have.

And then we’ve got to qualify the person. Anybody can get on the phone and say they do something, but we make them go through, we do reference checks, we have them complete a skills checklist, we obviously collect a lot of their education and certifications and make sure that they’re qualified to go on assignment.

And then after that, we really go to work on tailoring the job market to their needs. And so I think one of the biggest complaints we hear from travelers about other companies is, they just shove them in roles they’re not qualified for, just to get them on assignment somewhere. And the reality is, that just creates dissatisfaction with the hospital, creates dissatisfaction with the candidate.

And so we’ve got a robust database, and we spend a lot of money on artificial intelligence and automation to ensure that we’re getting a complete picture of what the jobs are across the country as much as possible. But we’ll also make calls on behalf of that candidate. We’ve got an extensive client network in our database as well, to where, if I’m working with somebody who is a CVOR nurse for example, I may have an extensive list of contacts that I work with in New York, if they want to go to New York, and I’ll give them a call and we’ll see what their needs are at that time. And so I think we’re not interested in just shoving people into jobs, we’re really interested in making sure they’re going and meeting their needs.

Kevin Pho: We’re talking to Patrick Dotts. He’s a health care executive. Today’s KevinMD article is “Efficient staffing partners for health systems.” Patrick, we’ll end with some of your take-home messages to the KevinMD audience.

Patrick Dotts: Yeah, I think the biggest thing to remember is, our health care professionals make the difference. Our role as Soliant is to really provide you guys an opportunity to explore not just the country but explore new opportunities, new skill sets, whether it’s your future employer.

We’ve got a lot of great stories around candidates who are on their second, third, fourth travel assignment and they fall in love with the hospital and they end up staying there perm. And those are great stories, even though we love to have people in the door. Our job is to make lives better.

I want to encourage anybody who’s a health care professional to really view their staffing partner as a partner and a colleague, and just know that you guys are making the difference, and that there’s a lot of opportunities out there for you guys to help, in not just the community you’re in right now but other communities around the country. You all are the difference makers, and we’re just here to help support that.

Kevin Pho: Patrick, thank you so much for sharing your time and perspective, and thanks again for coming on the show.

Patrick Dotts: Thanks.