Lead Inpatient Palliative Care Nurse Practitioner or Physician Assistant

New Jersey NP or PA license required. Inpatient setting at Cooperman Barnabas Medical Center, Livingston NJ.

About us & the role

NJ Palliative Care Solutions is on a mission to deliver palliative care without walls across New Jersey, partnering with leading health systems including RWJBarnabas Health. We are hiring a Lead Advanced Practice Provider (NP/PA) to guide Nurse Practitioners and Physician Assistants delivering hospital-based palliative care at Cooperman Barnabas Medical Center. The role combines direct patient care, APP mentoring, quality oversight, documentation standards, and practical program-building.

Leadership model: A clinical leadership role with protected leadership time. May be mostly clinical at launch; as the team grows, direct patient load decreases to create capacity for APP onboarding, shadowing, 1:1 mentorship, case and chart review, clinical escalation, referral relationship management, and performance improvement. Visibly different from a staff APP role: the Lead helps set standards, strengthen execution, and improve the team’s quality, productivity, and consistency.

Why you’ll want this role

• Real ownership: shape clinical standards, mentor APPs, and help build the program.
• Protected leadership time, with the operational and clinical support to use it well.
• Data-guided mentorship and a collaborative interdisciplinary team behind you.
• Academic pathways, CME, and a clear path to grow your leadership.
• Primarily a Monday–Friday schedule with flexibility to swap workdays.

Responsibilities

• Provide day-to-day leadership, mentoring, and clinical support to NPs and PAs.
• Carry a focused clinical caseload calibrated to team size — performing at the top of your license with best-practice, holistic, patient-centered, evidence-based interdisciplinary palliative medicine.
• Provide palliative care consultations and follow-up visits across the hospital continuum – from high-acuity ED and ICU encounters to ongoing management on medical, surgical, and specialty units.
• Lead goals-of-care and advance care planning conversations with patients and families, coordinating with partner SNFs and/or hospices if and when appropriate.
• Promote evidence-based standards, quality, and consistent documentation across the team — fully integrating into hospital workflows and shaping the palliative medicine practice.
• Give discharge planning as much attention as intake, managing transitions from inpatient to each patient’s next setting based on their longitudinal preferences and best interests.
• Support onboarding, shadowing, case review, quality review, and escalation workflows.
• Build referral relationships and represent NJPCS with hospital partners.

Requirements

• Active New Jersey NP or PA license and national board certification.
• DEA + CDS registration, or ability to obtain by start date.
• Minimum 5 years of palliative care experience.
• 1–2+ years of leadership, mentoring, precepting, team lead, or supervisory experience.
• Palliative care certification (e.g., ACHPN / CHPN) preferred.
• Strong communication, clinical judgment, operational follow-through, and interdisciplinary collaboration.

Pay

Competitive base salary: $160,000–$190,000/year. Annual performance bonus up to $25,000, rewarding both productivity (RVUs) and quality of care.

Benefits

• 28 days of paid time off your first year, growing to 33 days at 2 years, in one flexible bank.
• Malpractice & professional liability ($1M / $3M), license & DEA renewals, up to $1,000/year CME, up to $2,000 tuition reimbursement.
• Medical via Cigna PPO, including a $0/month employee-only option, plus dental, vision, and an HSA.
• Short- and long-term disability, voluntary life & AD&D, and accident / critical-illness / hospital coverage.
• 401(k) retirement plan, plus pre-tax FSA, dependent-care FSA, HSA, and commuter benefits.
• 24/7 Employee Assistance Program, identity-theft protection, legal plan, pet benefits, and member discounts.

Schedule

This position is full-time, primarily Monday–Friday with flexibility to swap workdays. For the right candidate, we're open to discussing part-time or per-diem schedules.