- Most nursing homes already pay agencies to cover nursing and aide shifts. In the first quarter of 2026, more than 7,600 US nursing homes bought 21.9 million hours of agency staff between them.
- The typical home that used an agency paid for around 1,280 agency hours in those three months — roughly 100 hours a week, or about a dozen eight-hour shifts.
- For a staffing agency, that changes the first conversation. These homes have already decided to use agency staff. The open question is which agency fills the shifts, and how reliably.
- For an administrator, the question isn’t whether to use an agency. It’s whether the agencies they use turn up when it counts.
01The shifts are already being bought
Staffing shortages in nursing homes are usually talked about as a future problem. On the floor, they’re a weekly one, and most homes have already solved part of it the same way: by paying agencies for nurses and aides to cover the gaps their own staff can’t.
Across the US, the first quarter of 2026 alone saw more than 7,600 homes buy 21.9 million hours of agency shifts. This isn’t a forecast or a survey of intentions. It’s spend that has already happened, and it repeats every quarter.
02Why “already buying” is the useful fact
Most staffing agencies sell the same way: find a facility, explain why agency staff helps, and hope the timing is right. The hardest part of that pitch is the first decision — whether a home uses agency staff at all.
For most homes, that decision is already made. They have budget for outside shifts, and their schedulers already know how to bring an agency nurse onto the floor. What they don’t always have is enough agencies that turn up when they say they will. That’s a different conversation, and a much shorter one.
03A worked example — the typical home
Illustrative. A home buying around 1,280 agency hours a quarter is covering roughly a dozen shifts a week with outside staff. Most weeks that works. Some weeks a shift goes unfilled.
An unfilled shift doesn’t disappear. It becomes overtime for the home’s own nurses, a tired team on the next shift, or an admission the home can’t accept because it can’t staff the bed.
For an agency with nurses and aides available nearby, this home isn’t a cold prospect. It’s a buyer with known volume and a likely gap.
04The missing piece is the introduction
Both sides of this market exist in every state: homes buying shifts, and agencies with nurses and aides to place. What’s usually missing is the introduction between a specific home with a specific gap and an agency that can actually fill it — at the moment the gap is costing the home money.
What a sharp agency or administrator does now
- Agencies: treat homes that already use agency staff as your best prospects. They need a reason to add an agency, not a reason to use one.
- Agencies: lead with coverage you can actually staff — which roles, which shifts, how quickly — rather than a general capabilities pitch.
- Administrators: treat a second or third agency as resilience, not disloyalty. One agency that misses shifts is the most common way a quarter of overtime begins.
- Both: check the agency is properly licensed in the state where the shifts are worked.
The worked example is illustrative and does not describe a specific facility.
Where Maitex fits
Maitex introduces nursing homes to licensed nurse staffing agencies. We speak to each side separately, and make the introduction only when both want the conversation.
Run a nursing home or a staffing agency? Email zishaan@maitexai.com.