Are you a highly skilled and dynamic Registered Nurse with a passion for critical thinking and ensuring seamless patient transitions? Do you thrive in a fast-paced environment where your clinical expertise orchestrates vital admissions and transfers across a multi-hospital system? If so, we invite you to explore this impactful opportunity to join our dedicated team as a Transfer Center Nurse (RN) at Virginia Mason Franciscan Health!
This is a pivotal role where your clinical judgment, organizational skills, and communication prowess will directly impact patient access and quality of care. As a Transfer Center RN, you'll be the crucial link, utilizing your nursing expertise to assess, coordinate, and facilitate patient movement across our regional network and with our valued community partners. You'll ensure every patient lands in the right place, at the right time, receiving the specific care they need with efficiency and compassion.
What You'll Be Doing:
- Regional Patient Flow & Bed Assignment: You'll serve as the designated point-person, coordinating and continually monitoring regional patient placement and bed assignments. You'll be the go-to for Virginia Mason Franciscan Health emergency departments, community physicians, and healthcare facilities requesting inpatient beds through our Transfer/Access Center.
- Clinical Acuity & Best-Fit Placement: Leveraging your advanced RN licensure and clinical judgment, you'll gather and interpret detailed patient clinical information and acuity. You'll assess if tertiary services are appropriate and determine the "best fit" Virginia Mason Franciscan Health hospital, unit, and level of care, then expertly search for available beds.
- Proactive Flow Management: You'll constantly stay abreast of bed demand, availability, and status across the region, identifying anticipated admissions/transfers/discharges. You'll maintain ongoing communication with EDs and other requesting units to identify shifting priorities and facilitate bed turnaround, ensuring beds are not left idle.
- Strategic Bed Assignments: In consultation with nursing staff, you'll analyze changes and make informed plans for new bed assignments based on clinical diagnosis, patient status, risk assessment, and availability. You'll also make/approve reassignments as necessary and ensure clear communication with staff at new locations.
- Patient Coordination & Communication: You'll maintain a running list of patients at home awaiting bed assignment, notifying them and their physicians promptly when a bed is available and communicating all pertinent data. You'll also coordinate pre-scheduled admissions to ensure beds are ready upon arrival.
- Interdepartmental & External Liaison: You'll consult with Bed Placement, House Supervisors, and Physicians to secure bed availability. If no beds are available in Virginia Mason Franciscan Health facilities, you'll coordinate directly with other hospitals for external placement. You'll also debrief managers/supervisors on critical patients, discharges, and issues at shift changes.
- Process Improvement & Standardization: You'll develop, coordinate, and collaborate on systems and processes to implement best practices for enhancing and standardizing regional bed management. This includes addressing workflow automation, maximizing hospital capacity, expediting throughput, smoothing inter-departmental handoffs, and minimizing diverts.
- Performance Monitoring & Reporting: You'll continuously monitor, track, and analyze patient placement systems (like NaviCare) to ensure data accuracy and currency. You'll produce reports and analyze trend data, including Length-of-Stay (LOS), to identify opportunities for process improvements.
- Troubleshooting & Resolution: You'll proactively address and resolve barriers to timely bed placement, investigating and following up on immediate bed allocation concerns. You'll explain regional processes to minimize misunderstanding and resolve conflicts within your scope.
- Training & Resource: You'll coordinate with and provide training to site-specific patient placement staff, serving as a valuable resource to management/staff on clinical issues related to bed placement.
- Multidisciplinary Collaboration: You'll collaborate with a multi-disciplinary team (e.g., care management, utilization review, finance) to address patient flow/bed placement issues and participate in enterprise-wide committee meetings to streamline access and reduce inefficiencies.
- Cultural Sensitivity: You'll ensure effective communication for diverse patient populations, understanding how culture can affect communication and care.
- Key Skills & Attributes:
- Exceptional clinical judgment to rapidly assess patient acuity and interpret diagnoses effectively.
- In-depth knowledge of patient placement, throughput standards, and methodologies.
- Strong analytical skills to monitor systems, track metrics, and identify areas for improvement.
- Outstanding communication, interpersonal, and negotiation skills to liaise with diverse stakeholders a must.
- Proactive problem-solver, capable of identifying solutions and making informed decisions under pressure.
- Highly organized, with meticulous attention to detail and the ability to manage multiple priorities.
- Proficiency with electronic patient placement systems (e.g., NaviCare).
- A compassionate, customer-centric approach to ensure patient satisfaction and strong professional relationships.
Why Join Virginia Mason Franciscan Health as a Transfer Center Nurse (RN)?
- Direct Impact on Patient Care: Your clinical skills and swift decision-making will directly ensure patients receive timely, appropriate care.
- Utilize Advanced RN Skills: This role empowers you to use your full scope of nursing expertise in a dynamic, high-stakes coordination setting.
- Shape Healthcare Operations: Contribute to process improvements and standardization that enhance patient flow across an entire regional system.
- Collaborative Environment: Work alongside a dedicated team and multidisciplinary professionals, making a tangible difference daily.
- Professional Growth: Develop expertise in regional bed management and healthcare logistics within a supportive environment.
- Meaningful Work: Be a vital part of providing compassionate, quality healthcare to our communities.
If you're an experienced RN with a strong background in critical care or ER, and you're ready to take on a challenge that optimizes patient access and operational efficiency, we encourage you to apply! We are eager to welcome a skilled and dedicated Transfer Center Nurse to the Virginia Mason Franciscan Health team.
