What Is The Cost of Hospital Employee Turnover?

Staff retention and engagement are a top priority for health systems because high burnout and turnover have a high cost. It’s expensive to replace physicians and nurses who leave and the cost for locums and travel nurses has increased threefold since the start of the pandemic. In addition, understaffed facilities struggle to maintain quality of care and patient experience with limited resources.

The data from recent research shows the financial impact that the staffing crisis is having for health systems:

• Staff report low satisfaction and high levels of burnout, and 39% of healthcare employees are considering leaving their jobs.
• The current average hospital turnover rate nationally has been on a steady increase and is now 25.9%.
• The cost of turnover for healthcare staff is high. It represents over 5% of a health system’s annual operating budget.
  • It costs about $25-30k to replace frontline support staff
  • It can cost $28k-$51k to replace a nurse.
  • It costs $500k to $1M to replace a doctor.

The average cost of turnover per employee is $50k - $75k. That costs an organization $1.25M - $1.87M a year for every 1,000 people it employs.

The goal for many leaders in 2023 is to improve the experience for staff to boost engagement and retention, both of which can impact the bottom line. One of the ways to help do this is through the use of a mobile app staff experience. Here’s how that can play a role in achieving those business goals.

• Studies show that an employee app can reduce wasted time by 15% and increase per-employee revenue by 5%.
• Mobile employee apps can also boost employee engagement and reduce turnover costs.
• According to Gallup’s State of the American Workplace survey the turnover rate for disengaged employees is 10 percent higher than engaged employees
• Companies utilizing an employee app were found to drive engagement levels to above 75%, which can save them anywhere from 25 to 65% on turnover costs.
• Cutting turnover rates by 25% would save over $300k for every 1,000 employees in an organization.

According to a report from Qualtrics, what most employees want to feel less burdened is: easier access to work tools, simpler processes, and better recognition for a job well done. A mobile app supports each of these efforts with a device that your staff are already using.