Your anesthesia department is expensive to run and hard to staff. You’re burning through locum budgets to cover gaps, delaying cases because you don’t have enough coverage, or both. Every month, you’re looking at the same problems: high costs, unpredictable schedules, and providers who are overworked or underutilized.
AANW has spent over 20 years helping hospitals and surgery centers across Oregon and Washington build anesthesia departments that work better. We’re an anesthesia management company that creates custom coverage solutions for our partners, not a staffing agency that just fills shifts. Here are three ways we help facilities improve efficiency and reduce costs.
1. Flexible Staffing That Matches Your Actual Volume
Most anesthesia departments are either overstaffed or understaffed. Too many providers mean wasted budget while too few can mean burnout, delayed cases, and expensive overtime.
The problem is that most facilities are locked into rigid FTE models that don’t account for how case volume actually fluctuates. You might need three providers on Tuesdays and Thursdays but only two on Mondays and Fridays. Or you have predictable summer slowdowns but can’t adjust staffing fast enough to avoid paying people to sit around.
AANW builds coverage plans based on your case types, block schedules, and actual volume patterns. We use a mix of full-time CRNAs who integrate into your team, part-time coverage for high-volume days, and flexible scheduling that keeps providers busy without leaving gaps in your OR schedule.
Because we’re the largest employer of CRNAs in the Pacific Northwest, we have access to credentialed providers who are already licensed and living in the region. That means we can adjust coverage without the lead time and expense of relocating someone from out of state or waiting months for licensing to clear.
Our flexible staffing approach has helped facilities reduce their anesthesia labor costs while maintaining or improving surgical throughput. When your coverage model actually matches your volume, you’re not paying for providers who don’t have cases to cover, and you’re not scrambling to find expensive locum coverage when you’re short.
2. CRNA-Led Coverage That Expands Coverage
In Oregon and Washington, CRNAs can practice independently. That regulatory environment creates opportunities to expand your anesthesia coverage without adding expensive physician headcount.
Most hospitals already know this in theory, but they’re not taking full advantage of it. They’re still using CRNAs primarily for routine cases in the main OR while anesthesiologists handle everything else. That might make sense in some settings, but it also means your capacity is limited by how many anesthesiologists you can afford to hire and retain.
AANW partners with facilities to use CRNA-led coverage more strategically. CRNAs can provide anesthesia for procedural areas like endoscopy suites, labor and delivery units, and outpatient clinics. This frees up anesthesiologists to focus on trauma, cardiac cases, and other high-complexity work. And it eliminates delays caused by trying to coordinate schedules across too few providers.
This isn’t about replacing physicians. It’s about using your anesthesia team more effectively so you’re not bottlenecked by artificial limitations. When CRNAs are managing cases they’re fully trained to handle, you get faster turnover, fewer cancellations, and better utilization of your ORs.
All of this has to align with billing regulations, facility bylaws, and patient safety standards. We make sure it does. The result is more cases getting done without adding to your cost structure.
3. Consistent Staffing That Reduces Turnover Costs
Turnover is expensive. Every time you lose a provider, you’re looking at recruitment costs, onboarding time, and weeks or months of disrupted workflow while someone new gets up to speed. And if you’re relying on short-term locums to fill gaps, you’re paying a premium for people who don’t know your facility, your surgeons, or your protocols.
AANW is proud of our low turnover rates. When providers stay longer, you get better continuity of care. Your surgeons work with the same anesthesia team consistently. Your patients see familiar faces. And you’re not scrambling to backfill positions or onboard new people who need time to learn your systems.
Better retention also means your anesthesia department runs more smoothly. Experienced providers know your facility’s preferences, your surgeon’s habits, and how to navigate the specific challenges of your OR. That translates to fewer delays, better communication, and higher satisfaction scores across the board.
We Build Anesthesia Solutions That Work
Most staffing agencies focus on filling open shifts. AANW operates differently. We work with you to understand what’s not working in your department and build a coverage model that fixes it.
That might mean designing a CRNA-led team for your GI suite so your endoscopists can increase throughput. It might mean restructuring your call schedule so you’re not paying overtime every weekend. Or it might mean helping you launch a new service line without adding full-time headcount you can’t afford.
We’ve been doing this for over 20 years across Oregon and Washington. We’re clinician-owned and operated, which means we understand what actually works in an anesthesia department versus what sounds good on paper but falls apart in practice. And because we serve over 80,000 patients annually across our partner organizations, we’ve seen what challenges hospitals in this region face and what solutions actually hold up over time.
Let’s Talk About Your Department
If your anesthesia costs are climbing, your coverage isn’t keeping up, or you’re tired of patching problems with expensive locums, let’s have a conversation. We’ll start with an honest assessment of where you are and what’s realistic.
Visit our contact page or call us at 503.594.1774. We serve hospitals, surgery centers, and clinics across the Pacific Northwest, and we’re ready to help you build an anesthesia department that works better for everyone involved.
