By Bruce Gipe, MD, System Medical Director, TeamHealth Critical Care
TeamHealth has over a dozen successful critical care programs across nine states and Washington, D.C. Caring for hundreds of patients per day, our teams provide quality critical care services for the sickest patients in these partner facilities.
Providing Steadfast ICU Support
Each critical care program is designed to meet the unique clinical and patient care goals of our partner hospitals. The benefits of a TeamHealth partnership are many. First, our national presence allows us to tap into a support network of almost 16,000 clinicians nationwide and provide ample resources to support programs across the country. This has allowed us to build a reputation for quality care delivery.
When minutes matter, high-quality, stable critical care is vital. TeamHealth’s history of work in the acute care space dates back decades, starting with our hospital and emergency medicine programs. Critical care support shines when we work with facilities that already allow us to provide their hospital medicine and emergency medicine services because of our integrated, multi-disciplinary approach to managing the clinical portfolio. Working as one team, our clinicians help improve quality metrics and patient experience across the continuum of care.
Our expertise in this complex, medically challenging service line allows us to provide the crucial ICU support facilities need. Support doesn’t end with clinical care, though. Operational support is vital to the success of any program, and TeamHealth’s ability to manage and lead all aspects of healthcare – from billing, metrics, clinician wellness and more – is another key to our clients’ successes.
Partnering to Recruit World-Class Clinicians
Another area TeamHealth excels in is our exceptional recruiting support. Critical care is a difficult service line to recruit. Partly, this is due to the low numbers of clinicians who specialize in this field. Each year, only about 300 critical care fellows enter the workforce. While they have different specialties, these clinicians are in high demand.
TeamHealth’s tenacious recruiting teams help staff our programs, ultimately ensuring that the sickest patients receive the care they need. Regular support from leadership ensures we have world-class physicians and advanced practice clinicians in our programs. Our Facility Medical Directors are active collaborators with our partner facilities to help guarantee that we have the right clinicians as they actively manage these programs. This was never more important than during the past year, when the COVID-19 pandemic caused massive upheavals in the medical community.
Support through the Pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic brought much of the world to a halt. Yet, healthcare had to continue. Despite the challenges faced each day, our critical care teams continued to provide life-saving care to the sickest patients. While our clinicians are accustomed to hundreds of critical care interactions on a normal day, this number doubled and sometimes tripled throughout the worst months of the pandemic. Because of this, it was vital that our boots-on-the-ground teams had support.
When faced with disaster, TeamHealth does not flinch.”
TeamHealth was able to deploy PPE even when it was most difficult to find and sent regular shipments to the facilities that needed it – an investment that totaled more than three million dollars. As a national company, TeamHealth saw the need for stability and uniformity of care. Early in the pandemic, we began the Emerging Infectious Disease Task Force, which provided guidance and education on best practices during the pandemic. Through white papers and resources, our clinicians remained up-to-date on the latest advancements and protocols during the pandemic. The critical care subcommittee of this task force was able to guide care strategies and build a foundation for resources going forward. This ability to tap into national resources is vital when faced with the unthinkable.
Not only were we able to provide vital resources, but TeamHealth also stood up functioning critical care programs amidst the ongoing challenges of the pandemic. From Phoenix, Arizona to Newark, New Jersey, TeamHealth helped our partners create stable, specialized programs to help unburden emergency departments and primary care physicians. All of this allowed us to continue to save lives, support our partners and care for our clinicians.
TeamHealth’s Quality Critical Care Program
TeamHealth’s culture is diverse, innovative and clinician-focused. All this allows us to provide the exceptional care patients need. Our teams deliver on quality patient care and experience. When faced with disaster, TeamHealth does not flinch. Our firm foundation and vast resources allow us to remain steady.
TeamHealth’s Critical Care program provides vital, unsurpassed care when patients need it most. Learn more about how our critical care partnerships transform communities by contacting us.