Healthcare and Healthcare Staffing Industries: Six things your employee screening vendor should be doing for you

Finding quality talent to fill jobs in the healthcare field has become increasingly difficult since the pandemic. These critical roles are needed more than ever to provide expert care to patients, yet are seeing fewer and fewer applicants. So now, more than ever, it should be top priority to provide an efficient, easy to use, and enjoyable experience throughout your talent acquisition process. This will set the stage for happier candidates and employees, while making your job more efficient. Below are six services your CRA should be providing, and areas you should consider when reviewing yours screening program to make sure you’re getting the most of it.

1. Collection site performance at your fingertips

In healthcare staffing, the difference of a day in turnaround time can mean a position is filled by a competitor. In traditional healthcare, a difference of a day means canceling dozens of patient appointments at the last minute because shifts aren’t filled.

Does your Third Party Administrator help you find clinic collection sites with the fastest turnaround times? Two different collection sites within minutes of each other can have meaningfully different turnaround times, influenced by use of electronic systems, quality and quantity of collection site staff, and error rates.

Vault’s proprietary system allows you to search our 17,000 collection site vendors by distance and by performance, ensuring you can balance the employee’s geographic needs with your desired time to fill.

2. Mask shipping and fit testing

Awareness of good mask fit testing is higher than ever, post-pandemic. When your prospective new employee goes in for screening, completing mask fit testing can maximize the visit and ensure they’re ready for their first day of work. Vault will overnight the right mask to your selected clinic collection site to make sure it arrives before your employee walks in the door.

Important questions to ask of prospective vendors: whether they ship masks, which masks and what their daily shipping cut off time is.

3. Scheduling of complex orders with real people

Have you ever tried to find a clinic to provide 10 or more services at one time to one prospective employee? Tuberculous screenings can be some of the hardest to find because the right TB screening depends on vaccination history of the employee and other factors. Add to that a physical, mask fit test, vaccines, titers, and a custom lab panel and things get complicated fast.

Do you find yourself alone are your desk, looking at with a confusing search result in your screening vendor’s software, full of in complete or undesirable options? Vault’s US-based Service Coordination team can easily handle your most complex screening needs, balancing travel time, clinic performance, available services, and cost to ensure the best outcome.

4. On-the-spot screening for hiring and training events

In the current market, employers are scrambling to hire and onboard before another company snatches up the best candidates. But, People Operations leaders are too busy to spend all day making collection site appointments and trying to track down paperwork. When time to hire and time to fill matters, you can’t afford to lose a prospective employee to a drawn-out or frustrating screening process.

Avoiding candidate drop out can be achieved by conducting screenings at in-person hiring events or on the first day of new hire training. But, without proper planning (think appropriate bathroom facilities, chains of custody, technology, number of collection staff, employee privacy), your onsite event may turn out to be more frustrating than it's worth.

If your current screening vendor doesn’t offer the flexibility you need to minimize time to hire and time to fill, let Vault help you audit and redesign your program for today’s needs.

5. Comprehensive program review and risk management strategies

When was the last time you took a top-down look at your employee screening program? Are you ready for a random audit by your internal auditor or a federal regulator? Will your employment screening vendor stand by your side during the audit? Do you know what to do with positive results for marijuana in states where it is legal?

Vault’s clients benefit from our compliance expertise in the form of:

·        Direct access to consult experts about your day-to-day challenges

·        Regular compliance training webinars

·        Available onsite training for your team

·        Policy and procedure review

·        US-based Medical Review Officers who offer unbiased expertise and guidance

·        Mock audits

·        Litigation and audit support packages

·        Expert witness testimony

·        Client-only update emails on changing laws and regulations

6. Return to work and recovery monitoring of employees with substance use disorders

No workplace is free from substance use –it’s a fact of modern humanity. However, the Quest Diagnostics Drug Testing Index shows the substance use positivity rates resulting from employment screenings during 2021 were 31.4% higher than the modern low, achieved just ten years before.[1] According to America Addiction Centers, 22.5% of Americans admit to using drugs or alcohol during working hours.[2]

Specifically in 2021, Quest noted that following about federally regulated safety-sensitive workplaces:

After five years of steady declines in several drug categories, positivity rates based on urine drug tests for the federally mandated, safety-sensitive workforce increased in 2021. Of note, marijuana increased 8.9% (0.79% in 2020 to 0.86% in 2021), amphetamines increased 7.8% (0.64% in 2020 to 0.69% in 2021) and cocaine increased 5.0%(0.20% in 2020 to 0.21% in 2021).

The good news is substance use is treatable and employees who choose recovery are often some of the most loyal and committed employees to an employer who supported them at their low point. In 2020, the National Safety Council reported employers can save an average of $8500 by supporting an employee recovering from substance use disorder.[3]

Vault has decades of experience providing random drug and alcohol testing to professional clinical licensure boards around the country and can implement a random testing program and return to work program to support the members of your team who are in recovery.

Vault is currently offering a free 30-minute screening program review with our healthcare compliance experts. A clearly defined program and policy ensures consistency, accuracy, and efficiency in your hiring process. Schedule today and we'll step through every aspect of your program and where you may be able to improve. There is no obligation or risk involved, and you'll receive a free report you can review with team members following the consultation.

Schedule your free review


[1] Workforce Drug Test Positivity Climbs to Highest Level in Two Decades, Finds Quest Diagnostics Drug Testing Index Analysis - Mar 30, 2022

[2] The Prevalence of Substance Abuse in the Workplace (drugabuse.com)

[3] New Analysis: Employers Can Save Average of $8,500 for Supporting Each Employee in Recovery from Substance Use Disorder - National Safety Council (nsc.org)

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