emergency medicine physician

family medicine physician

patient services representative

dietitian

certified registered nurse anesthetist

Penn Highlands Healthcare

I've been in the MIS department for a while now. It is a toxic environment with hardly any oversight. Coworkers nearly get into fist fights and management is ludicrous.  We self manage. There is no training for any process and any level of improvement we suggest is denied, from small things like a schedule change to large scale process overhauling to reduce calls, saving the hospital money and headaches. Changes are made to the systems without any of lower level staff being aware which causes deep misunderstandings on all levels until we get the communication "I changed that setting" from some random tier 3 individual that explains everything. Lower paid staff are expected to do a lot more work than upper level staff paid two or three times more. Higher paid staff have a very lax job and have time to get breakfast, play games, go across town for lunch taking 1 or 2 hour lunches, watch a lot of YouTube, play instruments, crochet, while on work time, meanwhile MCAs sitting at the helpdesk barely have time to go to the restroom or eat packed lunch.  You ask a question of one coworker and get your head bit off.  You can make friends but then you realize how lazy they are - you can't have a friend that pushes work onto you every chance they get. I would gladly take on more responsibility, perhaps there are some people that belong in lower paid positions with less responsibility. The rotating shift schedule for the Microcomputer Associate position is the worst schedule you will ever work in your life. Basically you are alone and responsible for upkeep of 6 different hospitals. You will not be healthy and all of your relationships and family time will be under fire constantly. They won't change it no matter what. 

Time off requires you to get approval and find your own replacement, but only if you are an MCA.

Moving into the higher paid position with less responsibilities - Systems Analyst - there is no room for growth after this. Those that sit at tier 3 do not quit, and there are no openings that coincide with the growth of the hospital.
The entire MIS department needs an overhaul. I have seen at least 20 people - most of which were very intelligent and hard working individuals - start and walk out the door over a two year span, and it is mainly due to the schedule and working conditions.

If you want this job, go for it, but never say you didn't know beforehand what you are signing up for. We are extremely short staffed and they will not hire anyone back post COVID layoffs.  

The pay is just not worth it. Something like $15 per hour to work 12 hour shifts on holidays, weekends, and during the week, changing from night to day shifts, working and sleeping and trying to keep your life together all the while the world keeps spinning while you are stuck working. Very bad for those who have any type of family or hobbies outside of work.

WE WORKED THROUGH THE PANDEMIC - and the hospital chooses to give us $0.15 for a raise - give me a break this hospital system is richer than rich while the staff get paid less than 1% of the hospitals revenue, meanwhile CEOs and big wigs rake in a lot more money than you could imagine. I guess they can erect buildings and buy every hospital or nursing home in western PA, but we can't get one more position? Favoritism exists all over and it's undeniable.  

These are the reasons I am seeking other opportunities. Anyone that hears our schedule is immediately boggled as to why it is like it is, but you would have to work here to find out the "why".

I would not recommend working at Penn Highlands, certainly not in IT, unless it is your last option. I would love to be able to recommend working here, sadly that is not the case. 

Initially, when I began here, the job had it's cons certainly, but it was a mostly enjoyable day-to-day, low stress overall, and a great work/life balance. 

I will break this down into organizational and departmental (IT) sections:

IT (Pros):

Coworkers can be friendly and helpful depending on who you talk to. There's a picnic in the summer, and occasionally appreciation is shown via pizza.

IT (Cons):

As a department, IT takes a very reactionary approach to everything. Rather than plan and prevent for the many inefficiencies which continue to back us up, we only react to them after they become problems. Many other coworkers within the department provide no support or even answer when you need to escalate or work with them on a portion of the environment they are supposed to support. It is usually easier to just do someone else's job than to even get them to do their own. The solution for any and all potential requests (from resetting a password to managing a massive project) falls on the helpdesk somehow, which just doesn't even make sense. We simply continue to operate as if we are a small healthcare system in one town, when we've acquired many new facilities over the years. Many tasks that should be automated are manual process, which again backs us up while we're trying to handle literally everything. The workload and stress has grown exponentially over the last couple years, and many of our concerns to remediate any of these issues continue to go unaddressed. 

PHH (Pros):

PHH certainly has some good going for it, pay was decent initially, benefits package and PTO accrual is pretty good. They have some events and basket raffles/prize drawings for employees and will occasionally show appreciation via pizza. 

PHH (Cons):

Once again I feel the cons for the organization come down to leadership and management. Ever since the 2020 pandemic furloughs and layoffs it has felt like the organization is trying to run as lean as possible. Their solution to the amount of work is to just have fewer people work on more aspects of the job. I used to think with the new acquisitions and buildings/projects that job security was a pro for PHH, however, after so many people have been laid off it is difficult to feel safe here career-wise anymore. For so long there was not adequate parking for employees, yet that's all they could keep reminding us is to not park in the yellow spaces. They continue to seem to acquire more and build more than we can currently support, and nearly everyone you talk to is clearly overworked. 

Sadly, I cannot recommend joining PHH unless it is your last option. I would look elsewhere if possible. I hope to be able to say differently again some day.

A few years ago, this was not a bad place to work.  But, Penn Highlands continues to grow and buy practically every hospital it can in this area.  Meanwhile to those who have to support those ventures, the responsibility is just silently added to their job description.  Pay increases are a couple dimes per year for an already low low wage. 
 Worked through the pandemic and I thought I was going to have a mental breakdown.  After the furlough passed, the hospital has literally become the worst place I have ever worked.  It's incredibly busy, incredibly fast-paced and they have lost their focus on employees and patients, and instead shifted focus to how to legally function with the least possible amount of staff and how to pump more money into the system.

We do NOT have the staff required and something is going to happen at some point and we will not be able to fulfill the demands of the system.  Easily avoided by employing more staff, but management is blind to this fact.

A typical day at work involves you doing the job of at least two to three people.  If someone in a higher position is on vacation, you have to cover their position as well as yours and make sure you do everything satisfactorily.

Proper planning is almost always absent, and management is clueless to what the employees actually have to deal with on a daily basis.  They are never reprimanded for not doing a good job.  With minimal understanding of the department they manage, they attempt to intervene and say "you should have done this" but it never makes logical sense. Scheduling is absolutely miserable.  When you have 3 staff covering 24/7 it is impossible to take vacations, spend time with your family, or have a healthy life.

Internal promotions come about and people with 10+ years of experience with no real issues are looked over to promote someone who has been employed for less than a year. However, the one with 10+ years experience continues to work as hard as possible.  The saddest part is, when that healthcare warrior decides to resign, they basically say "good luck" with no offer to try and keep that person.  After witnessing what I've seen, I decided it was time to move on to a different position elsewhere.  During the transition phases, I thought I would miss the hospital but after these experiences, I won't be back. 
 Luckily I am paid more now and treated like a human.

To think that the provided health insurance requires me to use PH Healthcare for services - YIKES.  I haven't been to my doctor in at least 5 years because Penn Highlands won't cover it (doctor is outside of my network).  You are also required to use their pharmacy which tends to be far more expensive than others in the area.  You are an employee at the hospital but end up spending more for your own healthcare because of this fact....weird.

This corporation does not care about its employees. What is happening now is there is a huge shortage of staff practically everywhere in the hospital. I notice these shortages specifically in the support roles - housekeeping, MIS, registration, medical assistants.

In my particular department, the jobs were not even posted. It seemed as if we were not even trying to fill the gap. Then you watch people take a weeks long vacation, and you have to pick up their responsibilities too. If we had more staff, our schedule could have been better, but we chose not to hire additional staff. The system continues to grow exponentially.  As we sit on the Penn Highlands trolley and look out the window, we see signs everywhere with $10,000 sign on bonuses - are we the forgotten? Do we even have a voice? Is this real? Wait - we see the HEROES WORK HERE sign out front, so we must be appreciated, or maybe they are afraid of losing their existing overwhelmed staff?

So what happens is, the good people pack up and leave and the problem worsens. The system continues to chug along at an alarming pace while we pick up the pieces and wonder what in the world is happening - we literally have no staff yet we continue to build, build, build, renovate, add services, add physicians, nurses, clinical roles but who will support them?  There is only so much someone can take and when things continued to worsen or remain stale with no improvement, you start looking into the future and wondering if it will ever get any better.

I learned a lot about the hospital system and how much Penn Highlands could care less about their employees. Culture was very stressful with work being piled on but no real compensation to back up the additional duties. I think the hardest part of the job was in fact the schedule and the demands of the system crashing down on you. A lot of weekends, and a lot of picking up other people's shifts. Taking a vacation is questionable - you might not get it if you can't find someone to cover your time off.  The problem is, there really is no one to cover your time off because we were running too lean - and like an engine, it might run great now but eventually it seizes up from the additional heat.

Management was overall nice, and they were receptive to ideas but most ideas were thrown on the backburner...areas of improvement could include listening to your staff and actually acting on the issues. We wait years to make a small change to a telephone number, years for a functional software that does not make our job more difficult to achieve. We literally implemented solutions that make our jobs harder, and combine that with reducing the workforce - and offer minimal improvement to the system as a whole - if any.

What is the future?  Well, see above.

I worked in a team environment. In one word, the only way I can describe it is toxic. I have worked so many holidays, and weekends, and many times left my family before finishing my supper.

Furthermore we were so short staffed that it is almost impossible to take ANY vacation time, unless you are a manager.

PHH continues to buy and build many buildings both in and outside of our area.  Management tries to address issues but claims it fails when it hits HR or higher management. Typically they turn a blind eye to any easily addressed issue or tell you they are working on a solution, but then you ask them the status about 6 months after you bring it up, and they are still working on a solution.  Eventually you give up trying because there are never any results.

The environment I worked in was so toxic and stressful. Everyone hated each other. We are not properly sustaining what we are taking on.

Lastly, and probably most importantly, staff are NOT paid here what they could be paid if they went elsewhere.  Meaning, PHH chooses to pay employees less than or JUST equal to the real market value indicates the employee should be paid. You can make up for this through overtime and holiday pay, but who really enjoys living their life at work, and basically stressing themselves out with a 24/7 shift architecture that management could care less about? 

I am not kidding when I say this, avoid like the plague. If you want to work at a hospital, choose another system, or find a different job.

Typical day depends on which department. Activities  residents in by 8:20 am,11:20 am & 4:15 pm depending on shift to eat. take residents into restorative to eat. Get clothing protectors on them, call to have meal brought in from kitchen, give food & drinks to residents, assist ones that can't feed selves. clean off tables & remove residents from room before next activity that is to be done.  Games played sometimes no clue on how to or directions how to play game. Assist residents in Rosary by reciting it for them, then exercise follows. Hardest part is pushing residents into room & rushing around to get them their meals & drinks when alone, before Aides help.    Receptionist consists of getting cash box, starting daily communication log, counting meal money, turning on phone & opening up doors for the day. making sure coffee machine if filled with water for visitors & residents,  keeping an eye on Pal Care to see where residents are if near doors & set off alarms. resetting door alarms when they do set them off. Answering phones & redirecting calls. Taking messages  & sending them through email when directed to do so. Keep in touch with Nursing & Maintance through walkies.  Go along with resident when going to doctor as a companion.

I truly believe that the experience you have with Penn Highlands will depend on the location (town/city) your job is in; whether you are in a hospital, facility, home health, etc.; and what position you are in. Having been in home health for a few years now, I will only be speaking of that side of things. There is no consistency in home health. Rules are different for every office and there are constantly exceptions made to rules, but they will turn around and scold you if you don't follow rules exactly as they've told you despite the fact that they'll bend or adjust them for themselves or others. Accountability is a joke. A paper trail is essential but can also hurt you. People around you will always have complaints, suggestions, ideas but will never take them to management for fear of repercussions. Some offices have been trying to fill positions for months now with no success. They will push work around onto anybody they can to make up for the lack of staff. Current staff seems to never know who is in charge of what. Very decent pay for the area (after pay raises due to not being able to fill positions) but I will be looking elsewhere in the very near future.

I was awarded placement at this job after successfully completing my college internship and graduating college. I worked in 5+ different offices within this healthcare system and was able to experience working for different specialty doctors. I enjoyed going to work every day, and I LOVED my job. I felt purposeful, valued, and appreciated. Often times I worked on tasks outside of my job description, and took on more work than was given to me. I liked being busy, and felt very organized. I had a great relationship with my supervisor, and she was very understanding of my needs outside of work. I had flexible hours, and received several small raises during my time here. The biggest downfall of this job was despite how hard I worked, I was never offered advancement or a full time placement. I lost this job due to covid shutdowns because I was a PRN employee. I had respect from all the doctors I worked with, and I am so thankful for everything they taught me. I truly enjoyed working here and loved going to work everyday. 

A lot of the people there are genuinely wonderful people. Unfortunately, a few unprofessional and abusive employees are allowed to act out without any repercussions from HR or Penn Highlands as a whole.
A lot of the departments are understaffed and employees are over-worked. Staff can get shifted around to different departments with little to no warning or training. The PTO rate/healthcare benefits/401k are decent. Unfortunately as far as PTO goes, there's usually no one to cover for you. So your PTO is left unspent. The pay is decent for the area but lacking when compared to neighboring healthcare facilities. When the covid pandemic originally hit in 2020, wages froze. There were no raises and no hazard pay. Many people were furloughed and never replaced.

My work day was very busy, between answering the phones, checking patients in and out, maintaining charts, filing, and helping others the time went so fast. I learned a lot at my previous job not so much about the job it's self, but the people I came in contact with. My co-workers for the most part were awesome, but there is always a few that likes to create problems. The patients taught me a lot also, some were battling severe problems that they had no control over, and it made thankful for the life I have. It created the drive in me to do what ever I could to help them even if it was a simple call or an extra push to get what they needed. I guess that was the most important part of my job to be able to help somebody in need.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Emergency medicine physician 5 salaries reported	$236 per hour
Family medicine physician 1 salary reported	$190 per hour
Patient services representative 1 salary reported	$24,000 per year
Dietitian 1 salary reported	$27.00 per hour
Certified registered nurse anesthetist 1 salary reported	$191,500 per year

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