When the COVID-19 pandemic hit the United States full force in March 2020, the country stood still. Thousands of flights were grounded, school was canceled, and millions across the nation started setting up home offices. But that wasn’t the case for the healthcare industry. If anything, COVID-19 accelerated the need for high-quality providers across America.
“At Floyd Lee Locums, our initial reaction was to immediately assess and respond to our clients’ needs with as much agility as possible,” said Chief Operating Officer, Nicole Burleson. “As COVID-related providers were more in need, we were able to shift our staffing model to encompass clinicians who were not previously working the locums model—a change that led to us staffing dozens of respiratory therapists within a couple of weeks.”
While Floyd Lee Locums had to manage the spike in facilities needing help and pandemic preparation, they also had physicians and advanced practice professionals out in “the field” already providing critical treatment and consultation to maintain the care continuum. Those locums professionals—many of whom were in locations that weren’t their home cities—were still a part of the Floyd Lee Locums family.
“We don’t view our team and workforce as ‘internal’ and ‘external,’” said Burleson. “Everyone is a member of the family and part of the team. We worked with our providers to understand where they were with COVID—who wasn’t comfortable traveling, who was high-risk, etc. We communicated the right information at the right time, so people understood changes to schedules and contract terms and what we were doing to keep them safe.”
This early pandemic preparation led to a more formal program as it became clear COVID-19 was sticking around for a while. To that end, Floyd Lee Locums set up a COVID Rapid Response Team in April 2020 to identify clinicians who were ready and willing to travel to hard-hit communities, as well as those who were ready to return to their original specialties and positions in non-COVID related areas.
As emergency licensing efforts came into play, and credentialing changes were made to ease the staffing shortages in the most impacted communities, the Floyd Lee Locums’ Operations team was at the forefront of keeping staff and providers apprised of changes—and working closely with clients to ensure clinicians could get to work with minimal paperwork and difficulties.
Almost 1.5 years later, many of these rapid response, credentialing and clinician/client support practices remain in place. If the pandemic taught the team anything, it is that courage and commitment persist, even in the hardest situations. But providers will always step in and step up to serve their communities. For Floyd Lee Locums, that dedication has meant everything.
About Floyd Lee Locums
Floyd Lee Locums provides an elite concierge experience to physicians and advanced practice healthcare clinicians in hospitals and healthcare facilities nationwide. Founded by industry veterans Matt Floyd and Natasha Lee, the company has built an exceptional team of experienced locums and healthcare staffing professionals.
Named the “2021 Best Staffing Firm to Temp For” by Staffing Industry Analysts (SIA), their hands-on approach to delivering best-in-class service, personalized career solutions, and coverage that positively impacts patient outcomes is setting a new standard in the locums industry.