September 29, 2023 • 9 mins
Dr. Iman Abuzeid, Co-Founder and CEO at Incredible Health, discusses hiring nurses for “Safety Net” hospitals.
Hosts: Carol Massar and Tim Stenovec. Producer: Paul Brennan.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
These is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Tim
Steneveek on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
So you know, everybody, Various parts of the US labor
force continue to flex their mess muscles over pay, benefits
and working conditions. Hollywood writers, they came to an agreement
this week. You got the UAW workers we talked about
this earlier still on strike, and then also this week's
CBS Health facing resumption of walkouts this week by pharmacists
in Kansas City, Missouri, which they are specifically protesting working
(00:29):
conditions in their drug stores and also some other locations.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Yeah, healthcare workers in general continue to feel stresses coming
out of the pandemic. It's something Our next guest has
talked with us quite a bit about her firm too,
helping to connect those in the healthcare space with facilities,
including in underserved areas. With what she's doing, we welcome
back doctor Ymana Buzaid co founder and CEO at Incredible Health.
It's a career marketplace for connecting hospitals to nursing talent.
(00:52):
She joins us once again on Zoom from Austin, Texas.
Doctor Abuzie, good to have you back with us. How
are you good.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
I'm doing well. Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
It's been quite a while since we've spoken with you.
Just give us an update on, you know, before we
get to what you're doing when it comes to safety
net hospitals in load of moderate income areas, talk to
us just about what you're seeing across the landscape right
now when it comes to medical professionals and you know
the numbers.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Yeah, absolutely. I mean what we're seeing is hospital financials
are starting to improve. Their margins are starting to improve
because you know, reimbursement rates are increasing as well as
you know, hospitals are getting a better handle on their
labor expenses. However, we continue to see an ongoing labor
shortage for nurses and other clinical workers. Our demands as
(01:36):
a country and our population is aging, so our demand
on the healthcare system continues to increase, and the supply
of workers is not kept up with that demand.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
All right, So I always think about, like how do
we get to a better place, And especially I think about,
you know, there might be enough workers in some of
the big cities or even that may be stressed, but
I do wonder about the underserved communities or the load
to moderate income communities. And I know you guys have
done some work on it. What are you finding?
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Yeah, absolutely so. About twenty five percent of the hospital
partners that we work with have facilities that are located
in low to moderate income communities. Some of these hospitals
are safety net hospitals, so they're caring for a disproportionate
number of uninsured or Medicaid patients. And so what we're
seeing there is that there's actually quite a lot of
(02:24):
interest from the nursing community to move and relocate to
permanent jobs in these communities. You know, nursing is a
profession that's a bit of a calling as well, where
they really want to help help a community and deliver care.
And so twenty seven percent of the hires that we've
seen on our platform over the last twelve months have
taken a job, a permanent job at a facility in
(02:47):
a low and moderate income community. Wow.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
So talk to us a little bit about you know,
why these areas have such a hard time attracting and
retaining talent. I mean, is it because you know I
talked to doctors. Actually, you know my friends who are doctors,
and they tell me they could make more money if
they went to one of these underserved areas, that's right.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
So the challenge with load and moderate income with facilities
and load and moderate income communities is that they have
even more of a challenge or attracting talent compared to
you know, hospitals in more affluent areas. Part of that
is just like, you know, there's fewer healthcare workers who
want to work in those communities, and then also oftentimes
(03:29):
they are more financially constrained, right, so what you can
do as a clinician in these communities can be limited,
but regardless, they're supporting you know, millions of Americans. And
so the message here is that it's just important to
understand that there are healthcare workers out there, There are
nurses out there that are more than willing to relocate
to facilities and load and moderate income communities. The challenge
(03:53):
has been is that they're not aware of these opportunities,
and so we need to just continue increasing the awareness
of some of these roles and some of the benefits
of working in these communities too.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Well.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
That's really interesting and it's fascinating to see kind of
the movement or the willingness to move, if you will,
and I'm assuming on your platform, that's one way of
kind of raising the awareness right and letting nurses know
that there are other places where they can go to
help out, or other healthcare professionals to help out.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
That's exactly right. When a nurse rates his or her
profile on incredible Health, they're entering their preferences and their experiences,
including their location preferences, and so we're able to present,
you know, opportunities that match what it is that they're
looking for. And so for the twenty seven percent of
nurses that have relocated for their permanent role in a
low moderate income community, they just they didn't know, they
(04:43):
were not aware before that these opportunities were there.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
You know, often when you've come on, we've talked about,
you know, the stresses in terms of healthcare workers, certainly
what they felt during the pandemic coming out of the pandemic,
but we've also talked about these shortages of health care professionals.
Is it getting better? Are we seeing more people come
in to this space or do you continue to see
(05:08):
pretty significant shortages generally speaking.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
Yeah. So, Look, the good news is, look, over the
last five to ten years, we have certainly increased the
number of healthcare workers in the US. The challenges that
increase is not kept up with the demand from the patients,
right because our population is aging, right, and so until
we have that, disparity is still quite huge, and until
(05:32):
that gets closed, we're going to continue to have labor
shortages across the country.
Speaker 3 (05:37):
What needs to happen earlier sort of in the life
cycle of somebody who becomes a healthcare professional, for people
to be encouraged to do it for the pipeline to
get bigger.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Yeah, So the great thing is there is a lot
of interest from Americans to join nursing and other clinical professions. However,
we have some important ballnecks that we need to solve. So,
for example, our nursing schools can handle any more capacity
and aren't able to train more Americans to be nurses
because they're limited on factory for example. Another ball on
(06:09):
neck is the training of nurses. So increasingly now we're
seeing more and more health systems offer training programs for nurses.
And then the third issues that we have retirement happening.
So this is an aging workforce and increasingly we are
health systems are switching are shifting to hiring nurses that
are earlier and earlier in their careers because they know
(06:30):
they have twenty five percent of nurses that are expected
to retire in the next four to five years.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
You know, I'm always surprised too when you talk to
me about kind of what's the average salary for a nurse.
I always think it's kind of informative, and I do
wonder if there's still if that is on the rise
to the upside, because are continuing to rise to the
upside because of the shortages that are out there.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Yeah, the national average is that ninety thousand dollars a year,
and in many states like California, for example, it's well
over one hundred. It's over one hundred and ten thousand
as the average salary.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
Is that fair? Is that enough? If it were enough,
then there would be more more nurses out there, right.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
Yeah, I mean so essentially this is classic supply and demand.
Because there's been a shortage, we've seen the wage inflation
continue to increase for this profession.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
So does that mean tim? Tim makes up a good point, like,
so does that mean it is bringing more people into
the system who want to be nurses? And I mean,
obviously you have to go through the training and the education,
but it is it bringing more people in terms of
the applicant pool.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
Yeah, the interest in the interest in nursing from Americans
is very high. You know, when nursing schools have each
nursing school has weightless of ten, you know, tens of
thousands of applicants that can't get in because of the
nursing school.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
Why don't we build another nursing school.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
We've talked about this, the lack of it's nuts.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
It is and it's going to take you know, we
have some hew systems that are acquiring nursing schools and
expanding them. We have increasingly more and more funding new
caulngars to expand number of nursing schools. So the solutions
are coming, but they're just not fast enough.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
But it's interesting, right tim when you think about like
inflationary pressures and wage pressures, like this is a dynamic
beyond that. We need it because there are people who
need healthcare professionals and nursing professionals, but it is a
dynamic and economic dynamic that maybe is one of those
reasons why we talk about persistent inflation.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Yeah, that's a really good point. And you know, doctor
abuset I want to just end with you know what
it all means for you and for the company at
Incredible Health, Like, what does it mean for your company?
Speaker 1 (08:30):
I mean for us at the end of the day,
our vision is just is to health healthcare professionals live
better lives and help them find and do their best work.
And so by expanding awareness of the opportunities in nursing. Uh,
That's that's the key role that we want to play.
And we want to make sure that even low to
moderate income communities get access to top healthcare talent as.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
Well, right equal access, Doctor emon Abuse, thank you so much.
Good to hear your voice again and check in with
your co founder and cee you at Incredible Health. As
we've reminded you in the past our views and our listeners,
it's a career marketplace for connecting hospitals to nursing talent,
so really putting them all together. She of course joining
us on Zoom.
Speaker 3 (09:08):
It's not funny we thought like that, you know, I mean,
it's not funny. It's interesting that we thought that the
pandemic was sort of this one time event that would
create a shortage when it came to healthcare workers, and
we're still seeing that persist.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
No, and the thing about nursing schools. I mean, my
sister's a nurse, and the nursing school she went to
that was torn down a few years ago. It's kind
of interesting that, you know, done that. Yeah, well, no,
exactly
These is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Tim
Steneveek on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
So you know, everybody, Various parts of the US labor
force continue to flex their mess muscles over pay, benefits
and working conditions. Hollywood writers, they came to an agreement
this week. You got the UAW workers we talked about
this earlier still on strike, and then also this week's
CBS Health facing resumption of walkouts this week by pharmacists
in Kansas City, Missouri, which they are specifically protesting working
(00:29):
conditions in their drug stores and also some other locations.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Yeah, healthcare workers in general continue to feel stresses coming
out of the pandemic. It's something Our next guest has
talked with us quite a bit about her firm too,
helping to connect those in the healthcare space with facilities,
including in underserved areas. With what she's doing, we welcome
back doctor Ymana Buzaid co founder and CEO at Incredible Health.
It's a career marketplace for connecting hospitals to nursing talent.
(00:52):
She joins us once again on Zoom from Austin, Texas.
Doctor Abuzie, good to have you back with us. How
are you good.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
I'm doing well. Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
It's been quite a while since we've spoken with you.
Just give us an update on, you know, before we
get to what you're doing when it comes to safety
net hospitals in load of moderate income areas, talk to
us just about what you're seeing across the landscape right
now when it comes to medical professionals and you know
the numbers.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Yeah, absolutely. I mean what we're seeing is hospital financials
are starting to improve. Their margins are starting to improve
because you know, reimbursement rates are increasing as well as
you know, hospitals are getting a better handle on their
labor expenses. However, we continue to see an ongoing labor
shortage for nurses and other clinical workers. Our demands as
(01:36):
a country and our population is aging, so our demand
on the healthcare system continues to increase, and the supply
of workers is not kept up with that demand.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
All right, So I always think about, like how do
we get to a better place, And especially I think about,
you know, there might be enough workers in some of
the big cities or even that may be stressed, but
I do wonder about the underserved communities or the load
to moderate income communities. And I know you guys have
done some work on it. What are you finding?
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Yeah, absolutely so. About twenty five percent of the hospital
partners that we work with have facilities that are located
in low to moderate income communities. Some of these hospitals
are safety net hospitals, so they're caring for a disproportionate
number of uninsured or Medicaid patients. And so what we're
seeing there is that there's actually quite a lot of
(02:24):
interest from the nursing community to move and relocate to
permanent jobs in these communities. You know, nursing is a
profession that's a bit of a calling as well, where
they really want to help help a community and deliver care.
And so twenty seven percent of the hires that we've
seen on our platform over the last twelve months have
taken a job, a permanent job at a facility in
(02:47):
a low and moderate income community. Wow.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
So talk to us a little bit about you know,
why these areas have such a hard time attracting and
retaining talent. I mean, is it because you know I
talked to doctors. Actually, you know my friends who are doctors,
and they tell me they could make more money if
they went to one of these underserved areas, that's right.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
So the challenge with load and moderate income with facilities
and load and moderate income communities is that they have
even more of a challenge or attracting talent compared to
you know, hospitals in more affluent areas. Part of that
is just like, you know, there's fewer healthcare workers who
want to work in those communities, and then also oftentimes
(03:29):
they are more financially constrained, right, so what you can
do as a clinician in these communities can be limited,
but regardless, they're supporting you know, millions of Americans. And
so the message here is that it's just important to
understand that there are healthcare workers out there, There are
nurses out there that are more than willing to relocate
to facilities and load and moderate income communities. The challenge
(03:53):
has been is that they're not aware of these opportunities,
and so we need to just continue increasing the awareness
of some of these roles and some of the benefits
of working in these communities too.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Well.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
That's really interesting and it's fascinating to see kind of
the movement or the willingness to move, if you will,
and I'm assuming on your platform, that's one way of
kind of raising the awareness right and letting nurses know
that there are other places where they can go to
help out, or other healthcare professionals to help out.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
That's exactly right. When a nurse rates his or her
profile on incredible Health, they're entering their preferences and their experiences,
including their location preferences, and so we're able to present,
you know, opportunities that match what it is that they're
looking for. And so for the twenty seven percent of
nurses that have relocated for their permanent role in a
low moderate income community, they just they didn't know, they
(04:43):
were not aware before that these opportunities were there.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
You know, often when you've come on, we've talked about,
you know, the stresses in terms of healthcare workers, certainly
what they felt during the pandemic coming out of the pandemic,
but we've also talked about these shortages of health care professionals.
Is it getting better? Are we seeing more people come
in to this space or do you continue to see
(05:08):
pretty significant shortages generally speaking.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
Yeah. So, Look, the good news is, look, over the
last five to ten years, we have certainly increased the
number of healthcare workers in the US. The challenges that
increase is not kept up with the demand from the patients,
right because our population is aging, right, and so until
we have that, disparity is still quite huge, and until
(05:32):
that gets closed, we're going to continue to have labor
shortages across the country.
Speaker 3 (05:37):
What needs to happen earlier sort of in the life
cycle of somebody who becomes a healthcare professional, for people
to be encouraged to do it for the pipeline to
get bigger.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Yeah, So the great thing is there is a lot
of interest from Americans to join nursing and other clinical professions. However,
we have some important ballnecks that we need to solve. So,
for example, our nursing schools can handle any more capacity
and aren't able to train more Americans to be nurses
because they're limited on factory for example. Another ball on
(06:09):
neck is the training of nurses. So increasingly now we're
seeing more and more health systems offer training programs for nurses.
And then the third issues that we have retirement happening.
So this is an aging workforce and increasingly we are
health systems are switching are shifting to hiring nurses that
are earlier and earlier in their careers because they know
(06:30):
they have twenty five percent of nurses that are expected
to retire in the next four to five years.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
You know, I'm always surprised too when you talk to
me about kind of what's the average salary for a nurse.
I always think it's kind of informative, and I do
wonder if there's still if that is on the rise
to the upside, because are continuing to rise to the
upside because of the shortages that are out there.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Yeah, the national average is that ninety thousand dollars a year,
and in many states like California, for example, it's well
over one hundred. It's over one hundred and ten thousand
as the average salary.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
Is that fair? Is that enough? If it were enough,
then there would be more more nurses out there, right.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
Yeah, I mean so essentially this is classic supply and demand.
Because there's been a shortage, we've seen the wage inflation
continue to increase for this profession.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
So does that mean tim? Tim makes up a good point, like,
so does that mean it is bringing more people into
the system who want to be nurses? And I mean,
obviously you have to go through the training and the education,
but it is it bringing more people in terms of
the applicant pool.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
Yeah, the interest in the interest in nursing from Americans
is very high. You know, when nursing schools have each
nursing school has weightless of ten, you know, tens of
thousands of applicants that can't get in because of the
nursing school.
Speaker 3 (07:44):
Why don't we build another nursing school.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
We've talked about this, the lack of it's nuts.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
It is and it's going to take you know, we
have some hew systems that are acquiring nursing schools and
expanding them. We have increasingly more and more funding new
caulngars to expand number of nursing schools. So the solutions
are coming, but they're just not fast enough.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
But it's interesting, right tim when you think about like
inflationary pressures and wage pressures, like this is a dynamic
beyond that. We need it because there are people who
need healthcare professionals and nursing professionals, but it is a
dynamic and economic dynamic that maybe is one of those
reasons why we talk about persistent inflation.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Yeah, that's a really good point. And you know, doctor
abuset I want to just end with you know what
it all means for you and for the company at
Incredible Health, Like, what does it mean for your company?
Speaker 1 (08:30):
I mean for us at the end of the day,
our vision is just is to health healthcare professionals live
better lives and help them find and do their best work.
And so by expanding awareness of the opportunities in nursing. Uh,
That's that's the key role that we want to play.
And we want to make sure that even low to
moderate income communities get access to top healthcare talent as.
Speaker 2 (08:49):
Well, right equal access, Doctor emon Abuse, thank you so much.
Good to hear your voice again and check in with
your co founder and cee you at Incredible Health. As
we've reminded you in the past our views and our listeners,
it's a career marketplace for connecting hospitals to nursing talent,
so really putting them all together. She of course joining
us on Zoom.
Speaker 3 (09:08):
It's not funny we thought like that, you know, I mean,
it's not funny. It's interesting that we thought that the
pandemic was sort of this one time event that would
create a shortage when it came to healthcare workers, and
we're still seeing that persist.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
No, and the thing about nursing schools. I mean, my
sister's a nurse, and the nursing school she went to
that was torn down a few years ago. It's kind
of interesting that, you know, done that. Yeah, well, no,
exactly
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