A locum shift at a rural urgent care differs from a shift in a city in two ways you can check before you apply. The trip is longer, and the clinic has fewer people and fewer services around it. The first changes what the shift pays for each hour of your time. The second changes what you'll handle during the shift.
The questions below apply to every role: physician, NP, PA, RN and MA.
Count the Whole Trip Against the Rural Shift's Rate
Add up your time from door to door. A ten-hour shift with ninety minutes of driving each way takes thirteen hours of your day. Subtract fuel, and a hotel night if the drive home is too long after a full shift. Compare what's left, per hour, with a shift closer to home.
Ask whether the clinic pays anything toward travel or lodging. A Rediworks listing says when a shift requires travel. If the shift details don't say, assume the trip is your cost. Each listing shows the rate, location, shift length and facility before you apply, so you can do this count first.
Consecutive shifts change the count. Two or three shifts on one trip spread the same drive across more paid hours. Ask whether the clinic has adjacent shifts open, and set your own limit for long days in a row.
Whether your travel costs are deductible depends on your tax situation, and your accountant can tell you. Our guide to locum tenens travel and housing explains the general rule.
Ask Who Is on Site During a Rural Urgent Care Shift
A small clinic can run with a small team. You may do tasks that someone else would do at a larger site, so ask who works the shift with you.
- Physicians, NPs and PAs: whether you're the only provider on site.
- NPs and PAs: who the collaborating or supervising physician is, if the clinic's arrangement has one, and how you reach them during the shift.
- RNs and MAs: who you report to and which tasks the shift includes. An MA's tasks depend on the state and on what the licensed clinicians on site delegate.
- Every role: who works the front desk, who takes x-rays, and whether the clinic manager can be reached on evenings and weekends.
Ask What the Rural Clinic Has and Where Patients Go Next
Clinics differ in what's on site, and a rural clinic may be far from the next place a patient can go. Ask these before you accept.
- Whether the clinic has x-ray, and who operates it on your shift
- Which lab tests run on site, which are sent out, and how results reach you
- Where the clinic sends patients who need a higher level of care, how far away that is, and how a transfer is arranged
- The ages the clinic sees, and whether it does occupational health work
- The EMR, and whether you'll have a login before the shift
The clinic manager or medical director should be able to answer each of these before the shift. If they can't, expect to work the answers out during the shift, and decide whether you're willing to.
Check Your License if the Clinic Is Across a State Line
Rural clinics near a state border draw clinicians from both sides. The clinic's state is the one that counts. You need a license that's valid there, and if you prescribe controlled substances, a DEA registration that covers that state.
Some roles can work in more than one state on a single license, and some can't. Licensure compacts for locum clinicians explains which. Practice rules for NPs and PAs also change from state to state, and the state board is the source for what applies to you.
Plan for Weather, Cancellations and the Drive Home
A canceled shift costs you more when you've already booked a room or started driving.
- Ask how much notice the clinic gives when it cancels, and what's paid if the notice is shorter.
- Ask what happens when weather closes the road or the clinic.
- Book lodging you can cancel.
- Drive the route in daylight before the first shift if you can, and check where fuel is available along it.
- Ask when the clinic stops taking walk-ins, when staff leave, and whether charting after close is paid.
Our guide to locum tenens contract terms explains cancellation and pay clauses in more detail.
Why a Rural Urgent Care Rebooks the Same Clinicians
A rural clinic has fewer clinicians nearby to ask. A clinician who has worked there and will return saves the clinic a new file and a new orientation. The second trip is easier for you too: your login works, you know the building and the staff know you.
If the first shifts go well, ask for the clinic's next open dates before you leave. How locum clinicians build facility relationships covers what makes a clinic ask you back.
When an Agency Fits Rural Locum Work Better
You may want to work far from home for weeks at a time, with flights and housing booked for you. A traditional agency with a recruiter and a travel desk does that. A self-service marketplace fits shifts you can drive to and arrange yourself.
Rediworks is a self-service marketplace for urgent care shifts. You build a credential wallet once and reuse it at every Rediworks facility, and each listing shows the rate and location before you apply. Sign up to see shifts.