Locum Tenens
Sunao Moore, MD
Emergency Medicine
Sunao Moore, MD, board certified in emergency medicine, has been working with VISTA and living the locum tenens lifestyle since the fall of 2003. A native of Chicago, Dr. Moore earned a degree in business from Brown University and completed her medical degree at the University of Illinois, Chicago. In 2001, she completed a three–year residency program in emergency medicine at Martin Luther King Jr.⁄Drew Medical Center (operated by the LA County Department of Health Services) in Los Angeles. She worked as an independent contractor in several LA area hospitals while she prepared for her emergency medicine boards, which she passed in September of 2002.
For Dr. Moore, locum tenens and emergency medicine are a great combination. She chose emergency medicine because it moves fast, and, unlike many other specialties, the physicians are able to see a variety of patients and work with a variety of illnesses and problems. By adding locum tenens assignments to her experience base, Dr. Moore has been able to add even more variety—from big city hospitals to county medical centers.
As she has worked in hospitals in seven states, Dr. Moore has found her experiences with patients and staff to be very positive. Her background and experience have been welcome additions.
In addition to the professional experience, locum tenens offers Dr. Moore the lifestyle she wants at this stage of her life. Traveling all over the country and staying long enough to explore is very important to Dr. Moore, and she has been able to earn enough money to buy a condominium, accelerate the repayment of her student loans, and help establish her parents in their retirement.
Dr. Moore was approached by more than one locum tenens company, but she chose to work with VISTA exclusively, and she hasn’t been sorry. "The VISTA scheduler and I just ‘clicked,’ and I haven’t needed to work with any other company," says Dr. Moore. "I have had great assignments, and VISTA has kept me busy while taking care of all the details."
For each new state, credentialing takes about two months. Dr. Moore supplied the basic information the first time, and after that, VISTA has handled the rest.
"There’s no additional work on my end; my recruiter takes care of everything."
Dr. Moore is now on a six–month assignment in Hawaii, but she just returned from a four–week vacation in Brazil. VISTA’s locum tenens program has allowed her to schedule her work time to provide larger blocks of free time so she can "see and really experience the world."
From Dr. Moore’s perspective, she couldn’t ask for a more perfect career choice than locum tenens. With every day, she can see that her experience as a locum tenens physician makes her better at her work, and the work is very rewarding. "Locum tenens helped me shake things up a bit from a professional standpoint. I didn’t want to get too used to working in one place and seeing the same things day after day. It’s been amazing to me to learn that different regions of the country have different kinds of ailments. I never would have experienced that if I hadn’t tried locum tenens assignments."
On the personal and social front, locum tenens is a great fit for Dr. Moore right now. Wherever she has gone, she has been able to make friends and spend time with associates from the hospitals. And, she never fails to take time to go exploring, wherever she is. As a result, she has seen Mt. Rushmore and the Badlands as well as rural Kentucky–places she doubts she would ever have gone without her locum tenens assignments.
For the next three or four years, Dr. Moore expects to be working as a locum tenens physician with VISTA. By then, her loans will be repaid, and her parents will be settled in their retirement. She may try Doctors Without Borders for a while and she may not practice medicine forever. She may start a business, but even then, she isn’t ruling out the possibility of working part–time in locum tenens. She has met a number of physicians with regular part–time practices who choose to augment their incomes and experiences with locum tenens assignments.
"Locum tenens is so flexible that whatever you plan to do, locum tenens can fit into your life."
SUNAO MOORE, MD
Emergency Medicine
