Some health systems are using a larger-than-life approach to staffing, buying up billboards as a means of recruitment. Some nurses are employing billboards to hold their health systems accountable when it comes to staffing.
Here are four recent examples of health systems — or their employees — taking to the road as a hiring call.
1. Lewis County Health System based in Lowville, N.Y., is using city billboards to search for OB-GYNs. The ads tout the area's "safe communities, great schools, fresh air" to garner interest and emphasize work-life balance.
2. Front-line workers at La Crosse, Wis.-based Gundersen Health System purchased a mobile billboard in January, calling upon leaders to invest in employees. They cited concerns with fair compensation, staffing and turnover. "Gundersen: Respect & Invest In Healthcare Heroes!" read the billboard.
3. Nurses working with the advocacy group Impact Healthcare purchased a mobile billboard to travel to Chicago-area hospitals, calling upon The Joint Commission to require safe staffing ratios as a condition of accreditation for healthcare facilities.
4. The South Carolina Hospital Association posted billboards in November as it sought to fill 9,000 open hospital jobs. The boards sported the familiar "H" hospital logo, with the tagline "H is for Hiring," to direct people to online job postings in their area.