Last week, the Jackson Health System, a six-hospital network based in Miami, announced it will be considering proposals for outsourcing physicians, physician assistants and advance nurse practitioners in its emergency departments.
The proposal request does not include registered nurses working in the emergency rooms, according to Ed O’Dell, corporate director of media relations for Jackson Health System. The healthcare system is also looking to outsource its billing and collections systems.
[See also: Outsourcing billing management for hospital physician practices]
“The bottom line is that in order to transform care at Jackson Health System, we are really questioning every system. We need to evaluate every aspect of how we do business, so that’s basically the reason behind requesting a proposal to outsource,” said O’Dell. “We’re trying to see how we can do things most efficiently and effectively.”
O’Dell said that just because a request for proposal was sent out does not mean that outsourcing the emergency rooms is a done deal. He added that in the past, the healthcare system had considered outsourcing in two other areas of the business – in its corrections health department in area jails and with its Medicaid eligibility-screening program.
O’Dell said they discovered that their own department could provide more efficient and effective services in corrections health than outsourcing the department to another company, therefore they chose not to outsource.
On the other hand, it was found that an outside company could provide the Medicaid-eligibility screening program much more efficiently so Jackson Health chose to outsource this area of the business.
O’Dell said that Jackson Health is still waiting for proposal responses. He added that many hospitals in neighboring counties have already chosen to outsource their emergency department.
“We aren’t blazing new trails with requesting a proposal like this. We’ve seen it done in other hospitals and we know it works,” he said. “The main thing is we will always make sure that patient safety and services are of the highest priority. This is a well thought-out process done by our organization.”