How Remote Patient Monitoring Solutions Are Combating Worker Shortages in the Healthcare Industry

While the Covid-19 pandemic resulted in the loss of jobs for a number of Americans, employers are now suffering from a lack of qualified candidates. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, there are over 9.8 million open positions across the U.S. while only 8.7 million Americans are searching for jobs. Unlike typical employment cycles, the downturn brought about by the pandemic has affected both job seekers and employers in very unusual ways. 

With the rapid shift away from traditional work practices to virtual meetings and work-from-home policies, employees are becoming used to the flexibility of being able to work remotely, being able to stay home with their families during the day, and the time saving nature of not having a daily commute. After having effectively gotten a taste for an alternative way of doing business, employees are no longer wanting to return to pre-Covid work environments. Unfortunately for employers, this means trying to fill these much-needed gaps and return to business-as-usual becomes even more challenging. 

Within the healthcare industry, this difficulty in attracting and retaining qualified talent is even more complicated due to high burnout rates of healthcare workers during the pandemic. This exhaustion has led to healthcare workers retiring from the industry at an accelerated rate to find employment in a less stressful environment. Those who stay are in such high demand that employers are being forced to offer higher pay rates and large sign-on bonuses to stay competitive.

While some facilities can afford the additional costs associated with attracting and retaining healthcare workers, none will be able to sustain these costs for long. As facilities seek alternative solutions, some are turning to technological solutions to compensate for lack of manpower.  This is particularly true when it comes to healthcare tasks that are time consuming and often uneventful, such as “patient sitting,” or simply the preventative monitoring of patients. In the traditional healthcare setting, patient sitters are assigned a single patient to monitor resulting in a costly, inefficient use of manpower for the healthcare facility. With advances in technology, such as remote monitoring solutions, facilities are now able to monitor between 12 and 16 patients in numerous facilities across a region through the 360-degree monitoring systems. Patient sitters are able to communicate with their patients via high-quality audio transmissions and have the ability to adjust the zoom and lighting of the high-definition cameras. 

At just $3 per patient monitoring hour, patient monitoring solutions reduce per hour costs of monitoring staff. In addition, a mere 10 staff members can monitor 90 to 108 patients per day, reducing staffing costs even further. In cases where patients present with contagious illnesses, telehealth monitoring solutions protect healthcare workers and other patients from contracting these illnesses, resulting in less risk for the healthcare facility.

As technology continues to shift the healthcare landscape, particularly in  post-Covid environment, remote patient monitoring technology offers a unique, cost-effective solution for healthcare facilities. 

For more information on remote monitoring solutions, as well as other healthcare-related technologies, contact Lynnetta Cleary at LCleary@communication-co.com or phone 574.299.0020.