Medical Staff Planning for System and Planned New Acute Care Hospital
Client/Profile
A mid-Atlantic regional healthcare system anchored by a 400-bed acute care regional referral center, with construction underway for a new 100-bed acute care community hospital
Challenge/Situation
To assist the client in determining its medical staff needs both for its expanding role as a regional referral center with several clinical centers of excellence, and for the opening of a new 100-bed hospital in a rapidly growing adjacent community.
Process
Veralon conducted a comprehensive quantitative analysis of the service area’s overall need for physicians, and a qualitative assessment of the System’s internal physician resource needs based upon strategic goals, clinical program needs and physician staffing requirements for the new community hospital. We employed extensive physician and management interviews and surveys to better understand perceptions of community and hospital need and to confirm strategic initiatives and program priorities. We utilized existing inpatient utilization projections for the new hospital to estimate physician staffing requirements.
Within the flagship hospital, targets for specialty-specific physician recruitment were developed for each of the new Centers of Excellence as well as other existing clinical programs. The recruitment targets took into account estimated deficits in community physicians, as well as specific program needs and expected physician retirements.
Results
We laid out specialty-specific recruiting priorities by year for a five-year planning period for both hospitals, with a total of over 156 physicians. In addition, Veralon estimated annual physician development costs (salary subsidies less revenue offsets) based on the recommended recruitment schedule.
As a result of this engagement, the client has initiated an aggressive recruitment effort that is based upon a comprehensive physician development blueprint.