ProMed HR Solutions

Holidays? Sick Days? How Hiring a Locum Keeps You Covered

ProMed HR Solutions explains how hiring a locum keeps you covered during staff absences.

Schedules can be pretty tight in a healthcare setting. If you’re even one person short, it can cause a backlog and all the associated hassle: annoyed patients, tired staff, and treatment delays. 

While some absences are sudden, others are planned. When you know what to expect, hiring a locum can help. In this blog, the team at ProMed HR Solutions explains how temporary healthcare personnel can cover your holiday staffing needs.

Who Uses Holiday Staffing in Healthcare?

This one’s easy: everyone! From assisted living facilities and medical offices to hospitals and clinics, all kinds of healthcare providers have experienced the benefit of hiring a locum to cover staff absences. When you deal with a trusted and reputable healthcare staffing agency, you can access pre-vetted, qualified personnel who blend seamlessly into your current team and ensure uninterrupted service delivery.

What Healthcare Professionals Are Available on a Locum Basis?

A wide variety of medical personnel earn additional income by working as locums. At ProMed HR Solutions, we have the skilled healthcare workers available in the following disciplines:

  • CLXT Technologists
  • CT Technologists
  • Echo Technologists
  • Laboratory Technologists
  • MRI Technologists
  • Nuclear Medicine Technologists
  • Radiation Therapists
  • Rehabilitation Assistants
  • Ultrasound Technologists
  • X-Ray Technologists
  • Physiotherapists

When you know you have a staff absence coming up, you can arrange for a locum to cover their shifts and responsibilities instead of increasing the workload for your existing team members. This way, you avoid staff burnout and everyone is in the best position to deliver quality patient care.

At ProMed HR Solutions, we ensure that all matters related to credentialing and licensing are taken care of before we send locum providers on an assignment. To ensure that we have a candidate ready when the need arises, we take a proactive approach to assure all paperwork is facilitated and we try our best to ensure your facility’s needs are met within their timeline.

How Does Hiring a Locum Keep You Covered?

Healthcare is too important to be short-staffed. By engaging a locum to cover the duties of an absent team member, your facility benefits on multiple levels, such as reliable service delivery, reduced burden on your team, and the potential to scale your services.

Quicker Availability

If you’ve ever conducted a traditional candidate search, you probably know how tricky it can be to coordinate start dates. Locums don’t usually need to give an existing employer several weeks’ notice. When they’re with a staffing agency, they are usually available to start working immediately: you don’t have to balance schedules while waiting for them to start.

When you confirm your requirements, ProMed HR Solutions will match you with a technologist from our talent pool. We typically require at least a few weeks prior notice to identify the best candidate for your needs, confirm their availability, and arrange travel and accommodation If one of your technologists is suddenly off sick for an extended period, call us to see what we can do for you.

Uninterrupted Patient Care

With an increasing demand for healthcare services across multiple settings, no one can afford to risk a backlog. When staff members get sick, have family emergencies, or need to schedule time off, your patients’ needs could be compromised. A staffing agency that offers holiday staffing can fill those positions without risking slower patient care delivery.

Improved Patient Safety

When healthcare workforces are stretched too thin, it makes service quality and patient safety harder to maintain. The healthcare trends reporter ECRI listed staffing shortages among its top patient safety concerns for 2022, emphasizing that the problem has existed before the pandemic and is becoming more urgent. With adequate staffing, you can prevent many of the safety issues that can result when employees are pulling double shifts and going without time off.

Reduced Overtime Costs

Overtime is expensive. When you have to pay your existing staff to cover someone’s maternity leave, holiday, or other extended absence, the cost can add up and take a chunk out of your operating budget. By hiring a locum, the work gets done without having to pay time and a half, which can amount to significant savings when you have a large team.

Avoid Staff Burnout and Turnover

Even before the pandemic, healthcare workers faced long hours and significant demand. Over two years later, many employees are not in a position to effectively do their own work while covering someone else, especially for extended periods of time. When you work with a medical holiday staffing agency, you have access to pre-screened professionals who are ready to manage a workload on their very first day. Other than a brief orientation, no training is necessary.

Scale Your Services

Hiring a locum can also assist you with staffing matters that aren’t related to sick days or planned absences. The needs of patients can change, even temporarily, in a way that requires either more staff or workers with a different skill set. Using a staffing agency may make it much easier to find the right people to fulfill your needs and those of your patients.

At ProMed HR Solutions, we only hire technologists who have a strong skills record and a proven ability to learn quickly and work independently. In all modalities, we require technologists to have a minimum of two years’ experience before applying with us, so when you approach us with your staffing needs, you know you’ll access candidates who can bring value to your facility.

With ProMed HR Solutions, Hiring a Locum is Easy!

As times change, so does the workforce. When Physiotherapists, X-ray technologists, and other professionals graduate from school, many are not seeking traditional full-time jobs, but work that allows them to practice a variety of disciplines in order to supplement their education. Some workers with experience are looking to try new work environments. Your facility can benefit from these additional workers in a variety of ways that include holiday and sick day coverage.

At ProMed HR Solutions, we can help you quickly find the qualified candidates you need. For years, we have been helping healthcare facilities access contract personnel for both short and long-term coverage, and can find the right professional for you much faster than if you were working alone. To schedule a consultation to discuss your holiday staffing needs, please visit promedhr.ca or call 1-833-776-6336 today.

Interested in becoming a locum?

We want to work with people that are highly qualified and motivated and willing to go the extra mile for our clients.

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