Hueman Helps Academic Hospital Decrease RT Agency Usage in 8 Months

Our Partner: A leading, not-for-profit academic medical center made up of hospitals, outpatient clinics, and physician practices

The Challenge

Our long-time RPO partner of 8+ years was experiencing a surge in respiratory therapy (RT) agency utilization during the winter flu season (December 2022 - February 2023). Throughout this period, they relied on the services of 55 agency RT FTEs at a substantial monthly cost of approximately $1.1 million.

Our Solution

In an effort to decrease RT agency usage and costs for our partner, Hueman suggested adding a dedicated recruiter to focus exclusively on sourcing RTs. Hueman’s dedicated RT recruiter leveraged a number of tactics to increase our partner’s RT candidate volume, including:

• Creating a marketing candidate persona
• Updating job descriptions to focus on SEO optimization 
• Cold calling of purchased licensure lists
• Establishing relationships with and active involvement with local schools
• Onsite open houses

Our Results

Within two months of introducing a specialized RT recruiter, Hueman and our partner began noticing significant improvement in recruitment and retention outcomes. This shift towards a positive net increase in employed RTs allowed our partner to reduce their reliance on Agency RTs, subsequently lowering costs.

Over the course of 8 months, RT agency usage decreased from 55 agency FTEs down to 29.6 agency FTEs. The decrease in agency usage resulted in overall cost savings of $350k per month.