As America’s largest integrated healthcare system, the physician shortage is felt almost nowhere as extreme as at the Department of Veterans Affairs. Serving over 24.1 million veterans, the VA has about 340,000 employees, with approximately 36,000 vacant healthcare positions. The deficit of healthcare providers has become particularly highlighted due to the recent scandal concerning the manipulation of veteran wait times at a number of VA medical facilities.
Robert McDonald, who replaced Eric Shinseki as VA secretary in July, discussed a number of solutions to improve patient wait times, such as staffing more clinicians. McDonald stated that VA needs to hire “tens of thousands” of medical professionals and that their compensation needs to be based on marketplace wages in the private sector to incentivize a career at VA.
With wages frozen since October 2009, updated pay tables propose an increase of $20,000-$35,000 annually for incoming doctors and dentists, and could go into effect as early as November 30, 2015. When all is said and done, VA is looking to hire approximately 28,000 healthcare providers to help handle the backlog at over 1,700 hospitals, clinics, community living centers, domiciliaries, readjustment counseling centers, and other facilities.
However, the fact remains that the United States is in the midst of a physician shortage. “There are not enough healthcare workers in the world, let alone the U.S.,” said Jill Schwieters, president of the healthcare recruiting firm Cielo Healthcare.
Searching for and staffing healthcare providers is a lengthy process and extremely important to the culture of an organization. It is essential that VA finds the best candidates to appropriately revolutionize its healthcare delivery system. During this lengthy review process, “the department may need to turn to temporary staffing agencies,” such as locum tenens firms, to provide continuous care to its patients.
Locum tenens providers deliver the necessary staffing coverage healthcare organizations need during the search for the perfect permanent employee, who may be extremely difficult to find. Utilizing such resources as those found with Barton Associates would allow VA to address delivery of care issues immediately, maintain continuity of care, and provide necessary services to veterans, until a permanent provider can be hired. For more information on services provided by Barton Associates and how we can help your organization work through the physician shortage, please visit Bartonassociates.com.
