Matt Fenner on the hidden cost of unfilled clinical positions and how Pulse Clinical Alliance is solving it

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When a clinical position is empty, the damage goes deeper than the vacancy

When a hospital bed sits unstaffed, the cost rarely shows up as a single line item on any budget report. It spreads quietly and quickly through every layer of a health system’s operations. 

Overtime expenses are climbing for nurses already stretched to their limits. Agency premiums paid at the last minute eat into funds earmarked for something else entirely. Patients get diverted to competing facilities. Quality metrics tied to reimbursement under value-based payment models start slipping. And the slow erosion of continuity of care creates risks no spreadsheet can fully capture.

The United States is in the middle of a clinical staffing crisis that shows no sign of reversing on its own. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects a need for more than 190,000 new registered nurses annually through the end of the decade. An aging population, rising chronic disease rates, and a wave of retirements among experienced nurses are combining to create a workforce gap that conventional recruitment alone simply can’t close. 

For hospital administrators and healthcare executives, the space between the workforce they need and the workforce they actually have is one of the most consequential operational challenges they’re facing today.

The financial reality most health systems underestimate

Research from NSI Nursing Solutions consistently finds that the average cost of turnover for a single bedside registered nurse tops $50,000 once recruiting, onboarding, orientation, and lost productivity are fully accounted for. For health systems juggling hundreds of open positions at once, those figures compound into financial exposure that routinely climbs into the tens of millions of dollars a year.

The real cost of a vacant clinical position isn’t just the salary it represents. It’s the cascading operational and financial fallout of a gap the organization wasn’t prepared for and doesn’t have a sustainable strategy to close.

How pulse clinical alliance was built to address this problem

Pulse Clinical Alliance, a Joint Commission-certified clinical staffing agency headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, was founded in 2016 on the belief that healthcare organizations deserve something fundamentally better than what the traditional staffing market typically offers.

The company places travel nurses, allied health professionals, surgical technologists, and per diem staff with hospitals, health systems, and outpatient facilities across the country. Its scope spans medical-surgical, telemetry, emergency nursing, operating room support, and a broad range of allied health disciplines, giving clients the flexibility to address vacancies across multiple clinical service lines through a single credentialed partner rather than managing fragmented vendor relationships.

The company places travel nurses, allied health professionals, surgical technologists, and per diem staff with hospitals, health systems, and outpatient facilities nationwide. Its reach spans medical-surgical, telemetry, emergency nursing, operating room support, and a broad range of allied health disciplines, giving clients the flexibility to fill vacancies across multiple clinical service lines through a single credentialed partner instead of juggling fragmented vendor relationships.

According to Matt Fenner, COO of Caplin Ventures, a Jacksonville-based investment firm and key stakeholder in Pulse Clinical Alliance, the urgency facing healthcare organizations today is real. 

“Healthcare organizations are under real pressure,” he says. “They need qualified people quickly, and they need to trust that those placements are actually going to stick. It is not just about filling a requisition. It is about putting the right clinician in the right environment and making sure both sides win.”

Joint commission certification and what it actually means for healthcare clients

Joint Commission certification is one of the most meaningful quality signals in the clinical staffing industry. It requires staffing agencies to meet rigorous standards for credential verification, competency assessment, background screening, and ongoing quality monitoring. These standards go well beyond what unaccredited agencies are ever required to demonstrate.

For healthcare organizations vetting staffing partners, that certification offers real assurance that the clinicians being placed in their facilities have been properly screened, and that the agency behind them operates under a recognized quality framework. 

In an environment where a single improperly credentialed placement can create serious regulatory and liability exposure, that assurance isn’t a nice-to-have. It’s table stakes.

Pulse Clinical Alliance has held that standard since day one and has built a track record with healthcare organizations ranging from community hospitals to large regional health systems. The company’s ability to respond fast to urgent staffing needs without cutting corners on credentialing is one of the main reasons health systems keep coming back to Pulse as a long-term partner rather than a one-off vendor.

The shift from vendor relationship to workforce partnership

The most significant shift happening in healthcare workforce management is the move away from transactional staffing toward genuine workforce partnership. Health systems that have treated clinical staffing agencies as emergency vendors, called upon only when vacancies become critical, are discovering that a reactive approach produces the worst outcomes and the highest costs.

Organizations that build proactive, structured relationships with quality-focused staffing partners are finding a more sustainable path. They cut their dependence on last-minute placements that come at a premium. They build a pipeline of clinicians who already know their environments and can return for future assignments. And they get a partner with the operational infrastructure and credentialing systems to support them consistently, not just when things get desperate.

Fenner points to responsiveness as the differentiator that matters most. “The healthcare system does not slow down. Facilities need support around the clock, and the agencies they work with need to be equally responsive. What has been built at Pulse is a team that understands the urgency and has the infrastructure to deliver at the level health systems actually need.”

The clinical staffing shortage is a structural feature of the American healthcare workforce for the foreseeable future. The health systems that navigate it most successfully will be the ones that build durable partnerships with staffing organizations capable of delivering quality, consistency, and real responsiveness at scale. Pulse Clinical Alliance has built its model, its reputation, and its operational infrastructure around being exactly that partner.

About Pulse Clinical Alliance

Pulse Clinical Alliance is a Joint Commission-certified clinical staffing agency headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida. The company provides healthcare organizations with qualified nursing, allied, and clinical professionals for travel, contract, per diem, and full-time placements nationwide.