Lowville: Recently, at a meeting with the Lewis County General Hospital managers, nursing home administrators opportunities and challenges that a nursing home faces in care services due to the changing environment became a topic for discussion.
On 28th Match, Lisa Bain, a nursing home administrator working at a county-owned hospital said to the board, “Providing services to the nursing home has become more complex.”
According to Mrs. Bain, Federal:
- Regulations are becoming more stringent
- There’s talk going around that legislation will pass, which would authorize higher staffing levels
- Insurance reimbursement will also change that will start a trend where more residents will receive coverage under managed care and few under Medicaid
Officials will have to monitor the changing trends carefully because there’s a high possibility that a few long-term residents will have to move out of the nursing home due to insurance related issues.
The report created also had some positive aspects:
The ratings of local nursing homes have been increased from 3-star to 4-star by the federal Center for Medicaid Services. They intend to allow the nursing homes to give a high level of satisfaction to residents and their loved ones so that the facility can be rated as 5-star.
Nursing homes can accomplish this by:
- Hiring the right people and by implementing the right staffing policies
- Focusing more on retaining staff by filling vacancies
- Increasing accountability by arranging the positions of staff members in such a way that a member of the management team is stationed on each floor
- Including residents when making any facility decisions
- Fixing issues on time
She aimed to bring it to the board’s notice that the nursing home should listen to the concerns the residents have.
There’s a Resident Council at the facility that has 54 residents and 17 families. All these people are active in making decisions when it comes to the hospital complex. One of the significant changes they have made at the nursing home is that staff members can self-schedule the hours of their shifts. This gives them a sense of control, and they arrive happier to work. They aim to ensure resident, as well as staff satisfaction.
For this to happen, it is required that every staff member cooperate. According to Mrs. Bain, this is an excellent method and so far has shown excellent results. While it’s hard to make sure that everyone is happy with the results, the four weeks of planning gives them plenty of time to find a balance.
In fall 2017, five positions were set up: One for a registered nurse case manager and four for registered nurses. Since then, the nursing homes have had no trouble in handling resident requirements.
Finally, Mrs. Bain said that all the facility needs to do is focus on how to be savvy and what steps they can take to improve customer service. Once they get the hang of how to treat both staff and the residents, they will do exceptionally well in the future.