I have fifty hospital accounts and can barely keep up with the credentialing. Everyday I have two emails to send this or that to one of them or pay a fee or read a new policy. My company does not allow us (reps) to click an "accept" or "sign" button until OUR legal department reviews the material which can take months. No sooner is the document reviewed when the hospitals adds another NEW document and again, I am out of the system until I can "check the box".
Whoever said this is absurd and impossible is correct. I am spending days not just hours each week to be able to even see my accounts. I have dressed down when on a quick call and walked in without signing in. However, it is getting tougher as each hospital requires badges and Godforbid you get caught inside an OR/ER/Lab without an approved stamped sticker on your chest. Even more ridiculous is that if I "CHECKOUT" even 10 minutes passed the time I said I was going to be in the facility, I get a "ding" to my rating that is sent to my manager. So now I just click that I'm there for most of the day. The bad news is if you have to go to multiple accounts, the vendor tracking still thinks you're at the other hospital and you cannot sign in again. . . I cannot predict how long I will be anywhere!!!!WTF?
I don't know the history behind these companies and to the credit of some of them, there is ONLY ONE FEE per company, per year for ALL the reps. I understand if we are in procedure areas the need for us to be trained and/or credentialed and to have our shots up to date. I can get this through Healthstream and show my card to prove it. I don't need to pay an outside company!
However, to click off on 20 some policies per hospital per year that have to be reviewed by MY company has now gone past impossible. The red tape and legal nightmare might be laughable if it were not true. I can only think of all the wasted money and time on lawyers and administration thanks to these companies and their mess.
I do not have an answer but industry needs find a way to get them under control. . . I say follow the money trail and see where it leads. I would love to see some reporter investigate the origins of Reptrax or Vendormate or another and see who started it/them, why hospitals feel the need to participate and where the money goes from both the companies and the hospitals. Has this really resulted in better patient care, has it hurt it? What about the patient and the twenty family members and snotty kids in ICU touching everything? If I am needed urgently in a case, has checking in delayed some of the urgent care reps from patient interventions? Family members and even staff kids get in without a badge and can stay there all day. The kids can run around the floors with unwashed hands, maybe without any vaccinations, and perhaps sick. They don't have to sign in or check anything and they can stay all day for days on end. This makes absolutely no sense.
Come on, I really want a reporter from national news to look into these credentially services. They are taking millions of dollars from industry! What it really comes down to is do they help or hurt patient care? Are infection rates better because of them or any other performance measure? Do they really work or are they just more red tape preventing industry from having a relationship with the practitioners that ARE healthcare? I thought the FDA had plenty of rules for us to follow. All of this BS seems like overkill to take money away from more important initiatives - maybe even drug innovation and collaboration between practitioners and industry.
Someone should send this thread to national news. . . come on folks - add to it. Let's hear from surgery and device reps!