Whether you work at a local hospital, urgent care clinic or private physician’s office, your patients’ safety should be a primary concern for your hiring team. Your patients entrust your staff with their health records and, in some cases, their lives, so you need to know that everyone you hire shares your organization’s level of commitment to your patients. Beyond that, health care facilities and each employee must maintain compliance with certain federal, state and local requirements, laws and mandates.
Conducting professional background checks for health care employees is crucial to get all the facts before bringing professionals into your health care business. If you want to learn more about the background screening process for your health care job candidates, keep reading.
Background Screening Process for Health Care Professionals
Mandates, requirements and laws at every government level are enacted and updated frequently. They evolve rapidly in the health care industry, especially as technology plays an ever-changing role, making it vital for health care organizations to fully vet every health care professional who is applying for a position. Basically, you need to ensure that your employees are educated, have the experience they claim, and are dutiful and law-abiding citizens.
A medical background check allows you to evaluate and analyze a candidate’s background, education, work history and any necessary credentials. With this process, you want to ensure that any potential employee will become a thriving member of your health care team devoted to your patients.
Since many of the top background check providers can tailor the health care screening process to the specific needs and concerns of the health care facility, you should have the most current and relevant information about each candidate at your fingertips to help you make the best decision for your institution.
Here are just some of the screenings you can obtain to learn everything you need about your health care professionals:
- Criminal background checks for health care workers, including a national criminal search
- Identity verification checks
- Employment screenings
- Education verifications
- International verifications
- Drug testing
- Driving records
- License and certification verifications
- National sex offender search
You can perform as many or few of these searches as you feel you need to protect your facility and patients. However, in any screening, it is crucial that you use only the best and most reliable sources. In many cases, a web search isn’t as accurate, up-to-date, or reliable as you might hope. That’s why many health facilities reach out to professional screening service providers for a fully compliant screening process that can protect you and your prospective employee against false findings.
Why Should You Screen Your Employees?
There are many reasons to screen your health care employees. Here are some top reasons to perform a background check on each health care professional you consider for employment:
Patient Safety
Knowing how vulnerable some patients may feel coming to your facility, it is your responsibility to hire employees who will do no harm to a patient’s physical well-being and will protect your patients’ privacy with their health records.
Hiring Ethical Candidates
Hiring ethical candidates means that you can trust them to provide equitable care to all patients they are assigned to care for, regardless of a patient’s race, religion or sexual orientation.
Ensuring Regulatory Compliance
Each of your employees must help your facility maintain regulatory compliance, such as those related to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA).
Navigating the Background Check Process
If you would like to start conducting health care background checks, or you need assistance conducting more involved screenings, our Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) certified team at Global Verification Network is here to help. Contact us today to learn about the health care verifications you need most.