Locum Tenens For Physician Assistants
Locum tenens for physician assistants refers to temporary work a physician assistant performs when another is not available. With these positions, physician assistants can work from any location they desire. In addition, they are given the freedom to choose their schedules. There is also the option of working abroad, for the souls that are really adventurous.
Secondly, when current physician assistants consider locum tenens, they perform an invaluable service to the medical community. For example, if a physician assistant gets sick or wants to take time off, they do not have to shut down their practice. Instead, they can just hire someone from the locum tenens pool. By doing this, they continue to make money while still providing medical services to their patients.
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Locum Tenens for Physician Assistants – Where Do They Work?
When someone does this type of work, their next job could be anywhere. The greatest need tends to be in schools, hospitals and government facilities, but if someone had an entrepreneurial mindset, they could also get work from individual doctors. In the case of our firm, we have many opportunities all over the globe, ranging from Canada to Australia.
How Does This Type of Work Affect The Physician Assistant’s Medical Career?
Positions offering locum tenens for physician assistants will only improve their medical careers. The reason why is that this type of work shows that you can handle a variety of medical situations. Even if you already have your own practice, by adding locum tenens work to your resume, employers will see you as being more well-rounded. In some cases even patients might be impressed with your experience.
How Much Can You Make with Positions Offering Locum Tenens for Physician Assistants?
In the United States, these jobs usually pay on an hourly rate between $75 – $150. However, the amount a physician assistant receives depends on their specialty and the location of their job. These physician assistants also receive compensation for any emergency calls they receive as well as their beeper time. Anything else they receive would be for travel expenses and malpractice insurance.
Locum Tenens & Medical Facilities
There are many benefits facilities can gain by using locum staff. First, they can cover for another physician while they are on vacation. Secondly, they can reduce the burden of a limited staff. Lastly, they ensure there are no gaps in a patient’s care.
There are many facilities that need this type of work. Some even establish long term contracts with these doctors. This way they do not have to keep rehiring when an existing doctor goes on vacation. The same is also true for organizations that want to increase their coverage ability. With this concept, clinics no longer have to turn away patients due to lack of staff. Instead, they can just have their backup doctors take care of everything.
This concept also come in handy for replacing physicians that decide to leave the facility. Even if their departure is planned well in advance, it can still take two years or more to find another doctor of the same competency. But if a facility has locums on staff, they do not have to worry about hiring another doctor immediately. For the doctors themselves, this type of freedom allows them to sample different specialties before making a final decision. From that point forward, they can then decide if they want to stick with that specialty indefinitely. If not, they can just move to the next assignment (which some doctors prefer anyway).
Locum Tenens for Physician Assistants – Who Does This Type of Work?
This type of work is appealing to almost any doctor or physician assistant. There are assignments for physicians of all levels, ranging from those who just graduated from medical school to those with 10 years of experience. However, overall, these physician assistants tend to fall in one of four groups:
- Newly certified physician assistants that want to experience different medical settings.
- Physician assistant that want to make a decent part-time income.
- Medical practitioners that want the freedom to explore another career.
- Physician assistants that have a more adventurous spirit.