Wexford Health received notice that the New Mexico Corrections Department (NMCD) had selected us as its vendor for correctional health care.  At the start of the transition in New Mexico, the contract’s medical provider fill rate was only 71.6%.  Wexford Health also inherited a dental provider fill rate so low—44.8%—that a dental staffing company was providing additional locum tenens dentists to ensure the NMCD had clinically appropriate coverage in its prisons.

Within one year, Wexford Health significantly improved the provider fill rate we inherited, hiring and retaining enough qualified New Mexico-licensed medical providers to achieve a fill rate of 92.5%. If you include providers who were hired but had not yet started at the NMCD facilities, our provider fill rate increased to 98.3%.

For dental providers—a position also recruited by Special OPS—we had a similarly outstanding positive impact on the abysmal numbers at the time of contract transition.  Wexford Health’s one-year fill rate for dentists in the NMCD was 70.8%. If we included individuals who were hired but not yet started, we filled 100% of the positions with qualified, licensed dentists—all of whom are Wexford Health employees, not contract clinicians sourced through a staffing agency.  

All of this success in recruiting and staffing providers is due to Wexford Health’s strategic decision to create, maintain, and select the right seasoned team leader and team members for our Special Operations unit.