For years now, healthcare managed service providers (MSPs) have offered a valuable solution for organizations looking for better ways to manage their workforce needs. Even so, misconceptions persist about healthcare MSPs, and the benefits they do or don’t provide. And in an industry that grows more complicated each year, the specific advantages offered by healthcare MSPs aren’t always clear.
But the truth is, these managed services can provide a critical difference in a facility’s ability to provide quality patient care, and even stay operational during a difficult time. In this context, lingering myths about healthcare MSPs that may prevent their wider use could cause real damage, especially for facilities struggling with workforce challenges.
So, for any leader navigating the healthcare workforce, it’s worth taking a moment to get a clearer understanding of the benefits offered by healthcare MSPs. With that in mind, here are seven lesser-known facts about healthcare MSPs that every leader should know.
Managed Services Myth-Busting: 7 Healthcare MSP Facts You Need to Know
Healthcare MSP Fact #1: It’s Designed to Benefit Everyone Involved.
Though the range of tasks they cover can be vast and complex, healthcare MSPs are designed to simplify the management of it all in a way that not only saves time for administrative teams, but expands their capabilities too. So, instead of introducing complexity into an organization, an effective MSP reduces it, bringing all aspects of the workforce into one single, easily-managed line item.
By connecting all of these aspects together into one larger system, and then individually managing each for maximum efficiency and value, a healthcare MSP can help organizations cut costs and build more operational capacity. It also gives them the chance to expand their workforce for the benefit of their patients, giving them access to more medical specialists and better after-hours customer service.
Healthcare MSP Fact #2: You Can Pick and Choose What You Need.
One persistent misconception about healthcare MSP is that it’s large and unwieldy, requiring a huge amount of effort to implement. The reality is just the opposite: The best healthcare MSPs are flexible and customizable, specializing in providing just the services that care-giving organizations need to succeed in their unique market and region.
That also means that there’s no need to replace entire departments, or key staff members. Your healthcare managed services partner is there to support you when and how you need it, and to add what’s missing — not to replace what’s already working.
Healthcare MSP Fact #3: Organizations of All Sizes Can Benefit.
Sometimes, smaller organizations think that healthcare MSPs are designed only for larger businesses — and larger businesses often think just the opposite! The truth is, though, that the scalability and flexibility of healthcare managed services means that they’re specifically equipped to provide services for organizations of all sizes.
On top of that, today’s leading healthcare managed services are fully customizable, as noted above. That means that each partner gets what they need to succeed in their unique market. So, healthcare MSPs are just as useful to a smaller organization that doesn’t have the resources for its own IT department as they are for larger businesses that need help managing the scope of their expanding operations.
Healthcare MSP Fact #4: It’s a Better Way to Keep an Eye on Your Bottom Line.
Contrary to one particularly persistent myth, MSP isn’t an expensive luxury or, even worse, a money pit. Healthcare managed services are just the opposite: A way for organizations to boost efficiency in areas where they may be struggling, thus helping them to improve workflows and cut costs in some of their most challenging areas.
Indeed, healthcare MSPs can offer a targeted way to find and eliminate waste, which can quickly and significantly impact an organization’s bottom line. Whether it’s reducing redundancy, streamlining manual tasks, more effectively delegating tasks, or a variety of other goals, healthcare MSP can provide leaders with the tools they need to rein in workforce costs, even in areas they may not yet anticipate.
Healthcare MSP Fact #5: It’s Much More than a Vendor Management System (VMS).
Another common misperception about healthcare MSPs is that they’re just a different, potentially more expensive version of a vendor management system (VMS). However, the services offered by MSPs — and the benefits enjoyed by the organizations that use them — are more comprehensive and strategic than those offered by a VMS.
In effect, a healthcare MSP helps you better integrate vendors into your larger operational systems, and thus get more value from the vendors you already use. It also helps you determine whether some of your existing vendors are falling short of their promises and costing you more money than they’re worth. You can read more about the difference between a VMS and MSP here.
Healthcare MSP Fact #6: It’s a Better Way to Address Digitalization and Cybersecurity
Offering a convenient way to bring vendors and systems into one network, the healthcare MSP model is also frequently embraced by organizations looking for help updating their electronic health/medical records (EHR/EMR) systems. At a time when cybersecurity is more important than ever in healthcare, MSPs can serve as a means to implement new and updated, system-wide data safety measures.
So, while one persistent myth holds that partnering with any type of third-party vendor, including an MSP, may put an organization’s data security at risk, the opposite is actually the case. By bringing all these vital services under one roof, healthcare managed service providers can help promote cybersecurity by applying one single, new standard to all of your processes.
Healthcare MSP Fact #7: It Offers the Power of Contingency Workers.
In the face of intense nurse shortages and more than a few other workforce challenges, the healthcare industry has embraced contingency workers more than ever before. This includes travel and per diem nurses, of course, but it also means that travel allied clinicians, temp workers, and every other type of healthcare worker — a variety of personnel that it can be difficult to find in one single place.
So then, finally, partnering with a dedicated healthcare managed services partner with a decades-long history as a leading staffing provider can give your facility constant access to a nationwide network of just those types of workers. From travel therapists to per diem nurses, they’re all fully licensed and qualified, and standing by to go to work for a facility that needs them.
Healthcare MSP Fact: You Can Depend on CareerStaff Unlimited!
Of course, not every healthcare managed service provider is equipped to deliver all of these advantages. So, when it’s time to choose a healthcare MSP, make sure you take the time to understand whether your potential partner has the nationwide presence and industry-wide reputation to meet every aspect of your workforce needs, now and in the months and years to come.
Learn more about how CareerStaff’s Joint Commission-Certified healthcare MSP services can help your organization meet its patient care goals: Contact us today to connect with a CareerStaff recruitment expert.