The professional role speaks to an RN's accountability, authority, and duty... to act in accordance with role obligations defined in scope of practice and professional nursing standards.

Ensuring that travelers meet or exceed competency standards—as well as comply with institution and company specific policies—is only the first leg of the journey toward a successful program.

The Department of Labor's (DOL) FairPay Overtime Initiative went into effect on Monday, August 23, 2004. Though the definition of "blue collar worker" has been more clearly distinguished to afford security to first responders—such as police officers, firefighters, paramedics, emergency medical technicians (EMTs), and licensed practical nurses (LPNs), regardless of experience, training, or pay level—it does not include a provision offering the same benefit to registered nurses (RNs). What does this mean for RNs and the facilities in which they practice?

With a workforce maturing at twice the speed of other industries, there is no better time than the present for acute care executives to consider how best to recruit, and retain, this growing resource and its wealthy knowledge-base.

While the majority of companies list many of the same details on their invoices, there is no industry-wide "blueprint" for billing.

Unlike new, permanent employees who may have two weeks to three months-or longer in some cases-to become accustomed to unfamiliar settings and protocols, travelers are presented with a brief induction and ordinarily expected to hit the ground running within a few hours to five days. Similarly, how supplemental staff is prepared for practicing within specific units tends to differ from approaches used to orient recently hired, regular personnel.

What happens when supplemental and permanent staffs are integrated successfully? Facilities benefit from a dynamic combination of distinct experience, innovative and time-honored techniques, and fresh and conventional perspectives -with the shared goal of providing quality care.

You believe that a traveler on assignment at your facility did not use good judgment in a clinical situation. Perhaps, while supervising an LPN or nurses' aide, the mobile RN didn't follow institutional protocol. Or maybe there is a completely different circumstance at hand, pertaining to attendance or tardiness.

In June 2003, Healthcare Traveler's Staffing Solutions convened a focus group comprised of directors of nursing, managers of recruitment, nurse recruiters, and other staffing executives from several acute care institutions in New York City. These professionals employ mobile healthcare providers and/or choose the firms with which they contract supplemental staff. Achieving a thorough understanding of the services that administrators require from staffing agencies was a key objective covered during the two-hour session.