Shared Staffing
The small hospitals in many systems sometimes struggle to find a way to provide economical night coverage. Hospitals below a certain size find it very difficult to justify a separate, in-house night provider. Some hospital systems have had success sharing night staffing, with the large hospital’s night hospitalist, nurse practitioner, or physician assistant providing telephone coverage for “cross cover” issues that arise after hours.
For example, when a nurse at the small hospital needs to contact a night hospitalist, staff will page the provider at the big hospital, and, in many cases, the issue can be managed effectively by phone. This works best when both hospitals are on the same electronic medical record, so that the responding provider can look through the record as needed.
The hospitalist at the small hospital typically stays on back-up call and is contacted if bedside attention is required.
Or, if the large and small hospitals are a short drive apart, the night hospitalist at the large facility might make the short drive to the small hospital when needed. In the case of emergencies (i.e., a code blue), the in-house night ED physician is relied on as the first responder.
Dr. Nelson has been a practicing hospitalist since 1988. He is co-founder and past president of SHM, and principal in Nelson Flores Hospital Medicine Consultants. He is co-director for SHM’s “Best Practices in Managing a Hospital Medicine Program” course. Write to him at [email protected].