From Crisis to Control: Revamp Anesthesia Locum Staffing to Supercharge Margins, Says Surgical Directions

CHICAGO, May 8, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Locum use has been on the rise in recent years—both increasingly preferred by providers themselves and accepted by hospitals in dire need of anesthesia staff. Unfortunately, this has contributed to soaring expenses and higher subsidies. It also forces hospitals to rethink surgeon access and surgical volume as anesthesia costs outpace the financial viability of surgical services.

"The cost of anesthesiology is threatening margins in the procedural care space," says Jason Klopotowski, MD, Surgical Direction's lead physician managing director.

A clinically active anesthesiologist and seasoned healthcare consultant, Klopotowski explores four ways that hospitals can proactively manage their staffing and scheduling to reduce unnecessary locum costs.

1. Leveraging Technology: Utilize predictive analytics tools such as Merlin™ to optimize patient throughput, anesthesia staffing, and surgeon access. This enables informed and forward-thinking scheduling decisions that better understand anesthetizing location and historic need.
   
   
2. Governance-Based Management: Establish a strong governance board composed of surgical services and administrative leaders to set and maintain access standards, ensuring more efficient and fair resource allocation.
   
   
3. Improved Caseload Management: Conduct daily reviews to streamline staffing based on actual case volume, preventing unnecessary locum use and optimizing resource utilization.
   
   
4. Educating Decision-Makers: Raise awareness among scheduling personnel about the long-term financial implications of heavy locum reliance, encouraging more informed scheduling practices.

These strategies can help hospitals achieve significant cost savings and operational efficiencies. "Once schedulers recognize how and when OR space should be used—and fully understand how anesthesia costs tie to surgical time—true cost savings can be realized in surgical services," comments Klopotowski. Per Klopotowski's calculations, if a hospital replaces locums with employed resources, they will save:

• Up to $3,200 per locum physician a day ($400 per hour x 8 hours)
• Up to $2,000 dollars per locum CRNA a day ($250 per hour x 8 hours)

"As you can see, the expenses can begin to add up quickly if you are using multiple locums per day without the surgical volume required for each OR to be profitable," Klopotowski notes.

Read Dr. Jason Klopotowski's full white paper here or visit Expert Insights at SurgialDirections.com/Insights for additional market industry metrics, trends and solutions.

ABOUT DR. JASON KLOPOTOWSKI
Dr. Klopotowski is Surgical Direction's lead physician managing director. He is a clinically active anesthesiologist with over a decade of experience in critical care medicine and anesthesia leadership. As an interim chair of anesthesia, he has shepherded multiple anesthesia groups through transitions to employment, working collaboratively with hospital leadership and the group to ensure efficient transitions with no disruptions to service or decrease in clinical quality. His active, on-the-ground leadership style allows him to deeply connect with the anesthesia groups he assists, and his clinical service with them during the transition gives him unparalleled insight into the issues they face.

ABOUT SURGICAL DIRECTIONS
Surgical Directions is a healthcare solutions company that has partnered with over 500 health systems, provider groups and ASCs. We collaborate to improve perioperative, procedural and anesthesia services. Surgical Directions helps clients enhance profitably and growth through consulting and workforce solutions powered by their proprietary software, Merlin^™. Our peer-to-peer leadership, clinical process expertise and predictive analytics help healthcare organizations tackle critical issues. Our clients achieve improvements in financial performance, culture, engagement, access and, most importantly, patient care. Additional information is available at www.surgicaldirections.com. 

SOURCE Surgical Directions