What is a Healthcare Staffing Agency?
In today’s healthcare landscape, nursing shortages are a big concern for healthcare facilities across the country. Healthcare staffing agencies act as a bridge between healthcare professionals and facilities, helping to address shortages while helping professionals find PRN roles that align with their skills and availability.
Whether they fill temporary gaps, address long-term shortages, or provide flexibility, staffing agencies play an important role in keeping healthcare systems running smoothly.
Cascade Health Services is a leader in healthcare staffing and has been at the forefront of the effort to fight staffing shortages. With a focus on serving the Midwest, we specialize in PRN staffing, travel nursing, and long-term placements.
Let’s dive into what staffing agencies do, why they are important, and some common questions nurses and healthcare facilities ask about healthcare staffing agencies.
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Services Offered by Healthcare Staffing Agencies
Healthcare staffing agencies cater to both healthcare professionals and facilities by providing services that match their unique needs.
PRN (Per Diem) Staffing
PRN staffing offers facilities the flexibility to manage unexpected demands, sick leave, or seasonal spikes. Nurses benefit from the freedom to choose shifts that fit their schedule, which helps them balance their personal and professional lives–avoiding burnout. PRN nurses also tend to get paid a higher hourly wage than staff nurses since they often work in understaffed facilities on short notice.
Travel Nursing
Travel nursing connects nurses with job opportunities around the United States (sometimes the world), usually in high-demand areas. Agencies like Cascade manage all aspects of travel contracts. We help find the best rates, keep track of credentialing, and look for your next assignment, so you can focus on patient care.
Temporary and Permanent Staffing
Whether a facility needs a short-term replacement or a long-term hire, agencies can provide a pool of pre-vetted professionals. This ensures continuity in patient care without the administrative burden of recruitment falling on the facility.
Specialized Staffing Solutions
Many agencies, including Cascade Health Services, offer staffing for specialized areas such as ICU, pediatrics, geriatrics, and behavioral health, ensuring facilities can maintain high-quality care in niche departments.
Why Healthcare Facilities Need Staffing Agencies
Staffing agencies provide valuable support to healthcare facilities in several ways:
Healthcare staffing agencies don’t just help with staffing shortages, they’re helping fight burnout. Nurse burnout is on the rise, and facilities often struggle to maintain adequate staffing levels. Agencies help combat nurse burnout by providing a steady stream of qualified nurses–making sure nurses get the breaks they need.
Staffing agencies can also be more cost-effective than recruiting and onboarding nurses. By outsourcing recruitment, onboarding, and credentialing, facilities can reduce staffing overhead costs. Especially for roles that aren’t permanent.
Healthcare staffing agencies are experts in navigating state-specific license, certification, and regulatory requirements, which makes compliance one less thing facilities need to worry about.
The Main Advantages of Staffing Agencies
Many healthcare organizations partner with healthcare staffing agencies to provide the best possible patient care during unexpected or planned staffing shortages and to bring in specialty nurses who they won’t need on a full-time basis. Here are the main ways healthcare staffing agencies give healthcare facilities an advantage.
1. Access to a wider talent pool: Staffing agencies employ a wide variety of qualified nurses. This allows them to provide healthcare communities with nurses who hold specific credentials.
2. Reduced time-to-fill: Recruiting qualified candidates takes a lot of time and work. Weeks of recruiting, interviewing, and filtering candidates can be streamlined to a singular phone call or staffing request by partnering with staffing agencies. Staffing agencies handle the entire recruiting and onboarding process for you so you can get back to patient care.
3. Flexibility and scalability: By offering flexible staffing solutions, agencies can cover your fluctuating needs. Because of their access to a wider talent pool, agencies can help by sending temporary staff to cover vacations, leaves of absence, or seasonal surges. Agencies can provide the right talent at the right time.
How to Choose the Right Healthcare Staffing Agency

Selecting the right agency is an important decision for both professionals and facilities. Here are some important things to consider:
- Reputation and reviews.
- What areas do they cover?
- Quality and reliability of employees.
- Support services, like 24/7 staff managers, scheduling tools, and compliance management.
Here are some common questions our clients ask:
- What types of contracts do you offer?
- How do you handle payroll?
- How do you vet candidates?
- How quickly can you fill needs?
- Do you have an HR team that manages employees?
FAQs About Healthcare Staffing Agencies
Here are some of the most common questions we get asked by new PRN nurses:
How do healthcare staffing agencies work?
Agencies partner with facilities and recruit qualified professionals. They handle recruitment, vetting, scheduling, payroll, and sometimes benefits management. Healthcare facilities reach out to staffing agencies when they need a shift filled. The staffing agency will alert all of the nurses who are available to help that there is an open shift and fill the gap.
How do healthcare staffing agencies get contracts?
Agencies form agreements with healthcare providers in a lot of ways, like through outreach or referrals. More established agencies leverage their reputation to create new partnerships.
How do agencies vet healthcare professionals?
This depends on the type of agency. A 1099 agency will usually have a minimal vetting process since 1099 contractors are technically not their employees, so the vetting process tends to fall on the healthcare facility.
W-2 healthcare staffing agencies, especially ones certified by the Joint Commission, take vetting very seriously. For example, at Cascade, we interview candidates multiple times, call references, run state-specific background checks, and more just to maintain our Joint Commission Certification.
What Sets Cascade Health Services Apart
Cascade Health Services stands out for its commitment to excellence in healthcare staffing. Here’s how we make a difference:
- Midwest Leadership: Ranked as the #1 healthcare staffing agency in Kansas City and #8 among women-owned businesses in Kansas City, Cascade Health Services has built a reputation for reliability and excellence.
- Benefits for Nurses: Cascade prioritizes the well-being of our staff by offering W-2 employment, which includes access to benefits like health insurance, retirement plans, and workers’ compensation. This is a huge advantage over 1099 contractors because benefits help retain staff, so facilities can see familiar faces.
- Client Success Stories: Facilities across Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Nebraska have experienced reduced turnover, improved patient care, and seamless operations thanks to our tailored staffing solutions.
Facilities and Nurses Benefit From Partnering With a Healthcare Staffing Agency
Healthcare staffing agencies are an indispensable part of the healthcare system, bridging the gap between professionals and facilities to ensure quality patient care even in times of shortage. From offering PRN staffing flexibility to navigating the complexities of travel nursing and specialized care, these agencies are vital in maintaining healthcare excellence.
Cascade Health Services highlights the best in healthcare staffing, combining regional expertise, a commitment to compliance, and a focus on employee well-being. Whether you’re a healthcare professional seeking flexible opportunities or a facility in need of reliable staffing solutions, Cascade is here to help you succeed. Together, we can address the challenges of today’s healthcare landscape and build a stronger, more resilient system for tomorrow.