Along with tending to their regular patients, many physicians often have on call shifts at hospitals as well. These on call shifts require them to remain on alert and ready to go in to the hospital whenever there is a need for additional personnel. These facilities may require the use of physician on call scheduling software in order to view and manage who is on call during any particular shift to effectively and efficiently call in the appropriate resource.
This scheduling software may appear to be intimidating at first glance but once you get the hang of it, on call physician scheduling will become much more efficient than if you continue to rely on the traditional pen and paper method, or even simple spreadsheets.
Here are some preliminary steps to take when starting out with physician on call scheduling software.
1. Create your list of physicians to schedule
The thing that needs to be done by a shift manager is to compile a roster of physicians who have on call responsibilities and enter them into the software. They should be entered separately from other shift workers so that they can be managed in a different way than personnel with regular shifts – especially if the on call shifts do not coincide with normal shift hours.
2. Create on call shift types
Next, the manager of the scheduling software must create and configure the necessary shifts to schedule the on call physicians to. Using the scheduling software, the shift manager is able to customize the lengths of the on call shifts, the specific days of the week they apply to, as well as how long the shift will remain in effect.
3. Determine shift thresholds
Once the shift manager has created the on call shifts in the scheduling software they can then establish minimum and ideal staffing thresholds for them to help guarantee that enough physicians are on call for each shift. When there are not enough physicians scheduled to be on call for a particular shift, the software will provide a visual cue, enabling the shift manager to fill any gaps.
4. Assign physicians to shifts
After the on call physician roster is in the scheduling software and the shift times and thresholds have been created, the shift manager can begin assigning physicians to cover specific shifts. All that needs to be done is to select the physician to schedule the shift for on a particular date and assign it to them using the software. Shifts can be recurring or one-offs depending on how the shift manager has configured them.
5. Export a shift schedule
With physician on call scheduling software, physicians can easily retrieve their on call schedules and export them to their own devices or their own calendaring systems. This way they are able to see when they are scheduled to be on call and for how long. Exporting a shift schedule is often as easy as clicking one button using shift scheduling software.
6. Override on call shifts
Whenever a scheduled on call physician is unable to perform their on call duties for whatever reason, a gap may appear in the schedule. The shift manager is able to view this gap in the scheduling software, override the initially-scheduled physician, and easily replace them with an alternate. Or, if the minimum staffing threshold continues to be met, the shift manager may also choose to leave the on call shift empty.
Looking for physician on call scheduling software?
If you are interested in acquiring physician on call scheduling software to streamline the scheduling of your on call personnel, look no further. SimplyCast's OnCall application has the tools you need to make your scheduling process more efficient and effective. Contact us today for more information!
