AMI Expeditionary Healthcare +
HWL
Answering The Call With a VMS Solution For Disaster Response
About AMI Expeditionary Healthcare
AMI Expeditionary Healthcare provides medical services to international aid organizations, humanitarian concerns, the private sector, and government agencies in remote and challenging environments. AMI’s services range from health consultancies and deployment of single-person aid posts and mobile clinics to full-field hospitals and global aeromedical evacuation solutions. Depending upon the customer’s needs, requirements, and desired healthcare outcomes, they can provide people, facilities, equipment, consumables, pharmacy products, procedures, training, or any combination of these services.
The Situation
When the Department of Health and Human Services contracted AMI Expeditionary Healthcare for disaster response assistance early in 2020, its staffing department comprised two people. These two individuals deployed healthcare providers to the fixed and temporary medical facilities where AMI was engaged. The DHHS knew the need for AMI’s turnkey disaster response services was coming, but no one had any idea just how great it would be.
The first engagement, at the site of the nation’s first COVID-19 hotspot in Kirkland, Washington, provided a glimpse of the challenges to come. AMI had relationships with four staffing agencies, all of which were leveraged to supplement the staffing needs of the Kirkland nursing home, where two-thirds of the residents had fallen ill with the new virus. The need was massive–a third of the nursing home’s staff had called out sick–and the residents needed increasing levels of care. The two AMI employees worked around the clock to evaluate and approve the flood of incoming candidates and manage the tedious task of verifying credentials and timesheets for the high volume of physicians, NPs, PAs, RNs, and paramedics deployed to Kirkland.
This was not a job for two people, yet the small AMI team managed to finish it. However, when additional hot spots emerged, and AMI received more assignments from the DHHS, it was clear that something had to change.
Key Challenges
Limited personnel: 2-person team managing submissions from 4 staffing agencies, with each placement requiring a series of manual steps
Increased demand: Rapid rise in demand for providers of all types stretched the nursing-focused AMI staffing team
Changing logistics: Each engagement brought new logistical challenges in terms of travel, lodging, and more
“The next assignment came from the Dutch government, which needed help setting up a freight cargo ship as a temporary ICU in the Dutch Virgin Islands. This project had the added logistical challenge of getting providers to Miami, where they would take chartered flights to the islands, but the team at HWL took it in stride. Jeff and his team were available any time, day or night, seven days a week,” says Ferrie. “I know they had other clients, but we always felt like their top priority.”
– Tim Ferrie, Chief Human Resources Officer at AMI
The Goal
Improve efficiency of the temporary staffing process to save time and reduce spend
The Solution
One of the four physician staffing agencies AMI partnered with in those early days was Jackson & Coker, a Jackson Healthcare company. Jackson & Coker’s Director of Accounts, Lauren Hill, understood the high stakes associated with each job order and knew her contact at AMI needed help to keep up with the demand.
“She suggested we talk to her colleague, Jeff Niles, at HWL,” says Tim Ferrie, Chief Human Resources Officer at AMI. “Jeff made the value of their technology instantly apparent. The vendor-neutral VMS was exactly the solution we needed, and they could get us up and running in a matter of days. HWL was instrumental in allowing us to answer the call in New York. Our success there galvanized the team and allowed us to take on more work.”
Jeff Niles, EVP of Sales at HWL, explained: “Through our VMS platform, clients can access a network of more than 100 vendors. We broadcast the need, agencies submit candidates instantly, and our team is there to screen and deploy providers in a matter of days– sometimes hours. With the team’s support, the technology shortens the staffing cycle, allowing a truly rapid response in crisis situations.”
Both the technology and the team were quickly put to the test when AMI was called on to set up a COVID triage unit adjacent to Beth Israel Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City, where ICU nurses and RNs, along with other healthcare professionals, were in extremely short supply. The vendor-neutral system gave AMI access to 100+ staffing agencies that could now submit candidates, credentials, and invoices through the VMS.
The Results
Over 472 unique providers placed on 811 contracts from Spring 2020 through 2021
WIth HWL’s support, AMI experienced exponential growth.
When the Georgia World Congress Center was retrofitted as a COVID-19 triage unit, AMI relied on HWL’s vendor-neutral VMS to help staff over 200 healthcare providers.
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic produced crises all over the globe, and for each one, AMI was engaged–HWL was there to offer critical assistance.
When AMI was tasked with setting up COVID units throughout the Navajo Nation, HWL was there, staffing approximately 400 providers throughout Arizona and New Mexico. The story repeats itself in San Mateo County, a second and third time–with each new wave–at the Georgia World Congress Center, and in Pennsylvania, this time to staff vaccination clinics for the entire state’s public-school teachers.
“We had six days to mobilize 600 personnel throughout Pennsylvania,” Ferrie says. “We could not have done it without the VMS and the team’s support at HWL.”
The HWL VMS platform–supported by a dedicated HWL team–buttressed AMI’s operations, allowing them to shrink the traditional staffing timeline and deliver a high volume of providers in record time. As a result, AMI grew exponentially–all while helping millions of people in crisis receive the care they needed.
