A physicist screens every physicist: how to vet locum coverage.

When you bring in outside physics, the vetting is the product. In a regulated environment, a wrong match isn't a bad hire you quietly correct — it's a patient-safety and compliance exposure. So the real question isn't "can you send someone," it's "who checked that this person can actually do the work?"

What actually matters

• Board certification, verified — not claimed. ABR or ABMP certification, confirmed on the board's own registry, not taken from a résumé line.
• Licensure matched to your state. Where the state licenses medical physicists, the license has to be for the state your facility is in — not the state the physicist happens to live in.
• Real modality and equipment competency. Whether they've actually commissioned and run QA on your class of linac, your planning system, your delivery techniques — not a keyword overlap.
• Scope, in writing. Who holds clinical responsibility, what's in scope, and what isn't — before anyone starts.
• References that speak to the work. Not a reference-in-name; someone who can attest to the clinical output.

The recruiter gap

A staffing agency matches keywords on a résumé and checks a certification box. What it can't do is judge whether a physicist can actually commission your machine, design your QA program, or hold coverage of record safely — because there's no physicist doing the judging. That's not a knock on recruiters; it's a limit of the model. You wouldn't credential a surgeon on keyword overlap, and physics coverage carries the same weight.

The standard to hold anyone to

Before a physicist reaches your program, someone qualified should have verified the certification on the registry, confirmed the license matches your state, interviewed for real competency on your equipment and modalities, and defined the scope in writing. If the firm sending them can't tell you a physicist did that screening, you're the one doing the vetting — after they've already started.