Practice staffing · Healthcare workforce platform and on-demand clinicians
ShiftMed
ShiftMed is a healthcare workforce company in McLean, Virginia, whose software and on-demand network of W-2 clinicians help hospitals and health systems fill open nursing and allied health shifts.
Strong fit
- Health systems that want to fill shifts from their own staff and float pools before using agencies
- Hospitals that want local per diem clinicians who are W-2 employees
- Systems that use QGenda or other scheduling tools and want open shifts routed automatically
Weak fit
- Small practices that need office staff or virtual assistants
- Facilities in markets ShiftMed does not yet serve
- Clinicians who want fast onboarding and steady shifts in any area
Bottom line
ShiftMed combines a branded shift app for a hospital's own staff with a marketplace of more than 250,000 local W-2 clinicians, and health systems use it to cut overtime and agency spending. It reports more than $200 million in labor savings for its partners in 2025 and signed Shriners Children's in 2026. Clinicians like the flexibility and instant pay, but App Store reviews are mixed, with frequent complaints about slow credentialing and support.
Score breakdown
Weights: Outcomes 35% · Product 30% · Implementation 20% · Pricing clarity 15%.
ShiftMed's buyers are hospitals and health systems, and its other users are the nurses, nursing assistants, and allied health workers who pick up shifts. A health system can give its own staff a branded app to claim open shifts, use ShiftMed's AI to route shifts to internal staff and float pools first, and fill the rest from ShiftMed's network of more than 250,000 local, credentialed W-2 clinicians, according to a September 2026 announcement. ShiftMed operates in more than 165 markets.
Pricing is by quote. Health systems pay for shifts that ShiftMed's own clinicians work and for the software that manages internal staff. ShiftMed competes with per diem staffing apps such as ShiftKey, Clipboard Health, and IntelyCare, and with large staffing firms such as AMN Healthcare. Among companies we review, Staffingly and Staffing For Doctors supply remote staff to practices, a different kind of staffing.
Todd Walrath founded ShiftMed in 2018 to connect long-term care facilities with local nursing assistants for per diem work, and it later added nurses and allied health workers and moved into hospitals, according to its about page. Its clinicians are W-2 employees with workers' compensation coverage, and its software connects to hospital scheduling, badge, and time systems, according to a HyperTrack profile. ShiftMed has an estimated $150 million in annual revenue.
In 2025, ShiftMed supported more than 631,000 shifts and helped health system partners save more than $200 million through lower premium pay, overtime, and contract labor, according to the company. Shriners Children's signed a nationwide partnership in June 2026.
The ShiftMed clinician app has a 3.1 out of 5 average from about 1,030 ratings on the App Store. Clinicians who get working praise the flexible schedules and instant pay, and many reviews describe months-long onboarding, rejected documents, few shifts in some areas, and support that is hard to reach.
What clinicians say
What people like
"I appreciate the flexibility the platform provides, the opportunity to pick up shifts that work with my schedule, and the convenience of features like Instant Pay." App Store
"They consistently have shifts in my area and make it easy to pick up and make your own schedule!" App Store
What people don't like
"They take months to approve any of your documents." App Store
"Contacting support is hit or miss." App Store
Competitor landscape
| Vendor | Overall | Ease of implementation |
|---|---|---|
| MEDVA | 7.8 | 7.4 |
| DocVA | 7.6 | 7.8 |
| Staffingly | 7.1 | 7.2 |
| Staffing For Doctors | 7.1 | 7.3 |
| ShiftMed | 7.0 | 7.0 |
Pricing
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Model | Health systems pay for shifts worked by ShiftMed clinicians and for workforce software. Pricing is by quote. |
| What usually drives cost | The number of shifts filled through the marketplace, the roles and markets covered, and how many facilities use the internal shift app. |
| What to ask before you buy | Ask ShiftMed what it charges per shift by role, how fast new clinicians are credentialed in your market, and how cancellations are handled. |
Leadership
Todd WalrathFounder and Chief Executive Officer- Jacob LauferChief Operating Officer
- Guljit KhuranaChief Technology Officer
- J.J. EwingChief Nurse Executive
Recent news
- September 2026: TIME and Statista put ShiftMed on their list of the World's Top HealthTech Companies of 2026, in the health information and management category. PR Newswire
- June 2026: Shriners Children's signed a nationwide partnership with ShiftMed to build community float pools for pediatric nursing, surgical, respiratory, and imaging roles. ShiftMed
Methodology
| Weight | Factor | What it measures |
|---|---|---|
| 35% | Customer outcomes | Whether buyers get measurable operational or clinical-workflow results after go-live |
| 30% | Product | Capability depth, reliability, and fit for the job the category buys |
| 20% | Implementation | How hard it is to stand up, integrate, train, and stabilize |
| 15% | Pricing clarity | Whether a buyer can model total cost without a mystery quote |
| Label | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Highly recommend | Strong outcomes and product with manageable caveats |
| Recommend | Solid fit for the right buyer; know the tradeoffs |
| Conditional | Only with a specific use case or heavy caveats |
| Not recommended | Avoid for most buyers in this category |
Read our full methodology for how we weight scores and assign recommend labels.