Physician Recruitment — Frequently Asked Questions

Physician and provider Recruitment is a term used to describe the complex, and often lengthy, process of posting open opportunities, sourcing (searching for), qualifying, and ultimately contracting (hiring) doctors as well as advanced practice professionals for a variety of healthcare settings such as hospitals, clinics and even telemedicine.

Physician and provider recruiters are responsible for posting job advertisements, screening applicants, interviewing candidates, setting interview schedules with hiring managers, and in some cases, providing the job offer to qualified candidates. They should have a solid background in healthcare.

The American Medical Association (AMA) reports that by 2032 (less than 10 years from now) we could expect to see a shortage of 17,800-48,000 primary care physicians and 21,000-77,100 non-primary care physicians. From this, we can derive that there will be even fewer candidates to fill an increasing number of vacancies or open opportunities. This means longer wait times for routine as well as emergent care, more communities without access to a physician, and overall fewer people who will be able to get the medical care they may desperately need. Physician and Provider Recruitment professionals utilize industry knowledge and resources to help healthcare organizations create a strategy to successfully share and fill their open Physician and Provider vacancies as quickly as possible.

• The average time to hire for physicians is roughly 126 days
• The average time to hire for advanced practice providers is 64 days

Keep in mind these are averages, depending on the specialty and location, time to fill can vary greatly.

A physician applicant tracking system (P-ATS) is software designed to track practice opportunities, leads, candidates, sources, and expenses related to each stage of an organization’s recruitment process.

A physician & provider applicant tracking system helps physician & provider recruiters match candidates to the best open practice opportunities. While also allowing them to manage leads by source, set up key touch points at each stage of the candidate pipeline, and automate reporting. All of which helps uncover opportunities to define, streamline, and improve recruitment processes.