The Nursing Home Podcast

Together with running her own CNA education program and separate home-care company, Aishling has a lot of experience with the types of people who become CNAs and the career paths they hope to lead. 

The difficulty of the tasks that the average CNA faces everyday cannot be minimized and many take on this job without even realizing how grueling it really is physically and emotionally. 

Aishling states that in order to weed out candidates that are prepared from those who might be a better fit at the nearby Target, employers must be upfront and transparent about the reality of what will be expected as well as required workload. 

The new expectations of staff used to a more modern, gig-economy influenced style of scheduling must also be taken into account. 

Communication should be established to determine what times staff will be able to work and put together a schedule that they will realistically be able to work with. 

Finally, employers should seek to mentor and foster the capabilities of CNAs. Work with them to establish a career path then support them on their way towards their ultimate goal. 

LEARN MORE ABOUT  AISHLING!

• Aishling Care Academy Website
• Aishling Home Care Website

RELATED EPISODES

• Episode 73: Make Your Staff WANT To Stay!
• Episode 71: Combating Staff Turnover & Burnout In Nursing Homes
• Epsiode 42: Healthcare Workers Need Self-Care During Covid-19

As a long-term care employment litigator, Richard has represented nursing homes and senior care facilities across the country. 

Litigations can come in a plethora of different forms, yet they all share the same effect of draining resources and time as well as disrupting workflow.

Richard states that in order to decrease the likelihood of litigations or at least maintain more control over the process once they play out, employers need to put in place several key protections and strategies. 

Firstly, good systems of documenting incidents need to be implemented. Since nursing homes often do not possess robust HR offices, documentation responsibilities must be shared between a number of inter-culturally aware, qualified personnel. 

These systems must be as up-to-date, easy to access, and user-friendly as possible to ensure that important information, such as signed employee arbitration agreements and incident reports, are easy to find and access. 

Training that clearly outlines policies around expected behavior and what is considered harassment must also take place regularly and be presented in an engaging way. 

Lastly, to maintain more control in court, eliminate the threat of a jury, and minimize the chance of a class or collective action, employers should seek out an arbitration program.

Contact Richard

• LinkedIn
• ¬†[email protected]

Related Episodes

• Solving the Staffing Challenge in Nursing Homes¬†
• Staffing, Retention and Vendor Relations with 3rd Generation Operator; Mark Kaszirer

Originally in construction, Motty shifted his focus completely to flooring after realizing the room for innovation, and how little was known about the trade even by flooring professionals.

 

Many operators don’t even realize that their floors do not meet the requirements of statewide health regulations.

 

Motty explains that under the requirements of OSHPD, which sets the building standards for senior care in California, facilities may only use carpet or VCT (vinyl) for flooring.

 

Carpet is not very stable and often a hazard in nursing homes. This leaves VCT which requires a lot of care and cleaning as it becomes worn very easily.

 

Having built facilities from scratch Motty knows that flooring is always the biggest issue and makes the biggest difference in every project. He states that floors have a dramatic effect on a space and a nice clean floor can bring a building to life.

 

This is why it is essential to fit a facility with a durable, long-lasting floor rather than one that is less expensive and will need to be continuously redone and replaced.

 

After years of researching and tweaking other products, Motty engineered his own type of vinyl that is more durable than regular VCT and will remain unblemished by bleach and disinfectant.

 

Motty states that when looking to remodel facility floors, operators should do a lot of research, know the difference between commercial and residential flooring, and understand that price is not necessarily the best indicator of quality.

 

FOLLOW MOTTY AND HIS COMPANY RITZ FLOORING, INC.

• Website
• LinkedIn

 

RELATED EPISODES

• Ep. 61: Real Time Fall Prevention
• Ep. 23: Keep the House and Still Get the Care You Deserve¬†
• Ep. 11: Follow the Scent¬†

With his company Comprehensive A/R Solutions, Israel has seen all the ways that inattention to a billing team can wreak havoc on a facility.

 

In a difficult industry, nursing home operators must maximize every penny they receive. Despite this necessity, facilities typically have a lot of bad debt left on the table, often totaling to hundreds of dollars of uncollected receivables.

 

Rather than spending time and effort searching for ways to receive reimbursement for this bad debt, operators should instead focus on decreasing it as much as possible.

 

Due to typical billing cycles and the fact that operators do not have time to manage A/R, billing is often only done reactively and problems encountered only after the window where they could have been resolved.

 

In order to ensure that there is no money left on the table, operators need to conduct A/R proactively rather than reactively.

 

This can be accomplished firstly by making sure one’s billing team isn’t understaffed. With all the nitty gritty work that it involves, A/R is certainly not something that can be done by a receptionist between shifts.

 

It is also essential that the team center around an expert experienced in A/R and the ever changing trends of insurance and medicaid. This person should work proactively by planning and implementing processes to identify and mitigate these changes.

 

They should also be assigned to watch every patient’s payer source from the point of admission to discharge to detect any changes or inconsistencies before they become a real problem.

 

FOLLOW  ISRAEL

• Website¬†
• Email: [email protected]
• Toll Free Phone Number: (877) 942-4558

 

RELATED EPISODES 

• Ep. 30: Don't You Love All That Admission Paperwork?!
• Ep. 26: Consistent Leadership in Nursing Homes
• Ep. 8: Megadata in Nursing Homes with Shalom Reinman

Izzy has explored these discoveries with his company GBC Facility Services, which provides full janitorial services for healthcare and other facilities. 

 

With mass burnout and not much money, nursing home staff are rapidly leaving their professions for better paying, less stressful opportunities. 

 

In order to keep staff, senior care employers need to shift their mindset from one of hierarchy and chain of command to one of servant leadership, where everyone feels valued and cared for. 

 

To implement servant leadership in their company employers should follow a plan similar to the one detailed below: 

 

First, a connection meeting should be held around 2-3 months after a new employee is hired to discuss how they would like to be treated. Next, a weekly one-on-one should happen once a week to recap their work and give them recognition. 

 

The plan should also contain coaching during the game to create an ongoing dialog, discussing a personal development strategy with the employee to find out and acknowledge their career goals, and lastly performance reviews to discuss how they can improve. 

 

Even if this sort of plan for conducting servant leadership may be too time-consuming for busy senior care facilities, just a five-minute weekly conversation with nursing staff will make a huge difference.

 

FOLLOW IZZY AND GBC FACILITY SERVICES

• Website
• LinkedIn

 

RELATED EPISODES

• Ep. 71: Combating Staff Turnover & Burnout In Nursing Homes
• Ep. 51: Solving the Staffing Challenge in Nursing Homes
• Ep. 35: Support Your Nursing Home Staff During Coronavirus Outbreaks

Nancy’s podcast Glowing Older examines the intersection of wellness and senior care. With 25 years in the hospitality, health, and wellness industries, she has deep knowledge of the mental and physical benefits wellness can provide.

 

Wellness not only signifies keeping people healthy but also providing them with a good standard of living.

 

While senior care possesses the goal of keeping patients alive and healthy, it is also a very institutionalized setting, often reducing patients to numbers and diagnoses.

 

This inevitable dehumanization is due in large part to our society’s stigma of its elderly population. Many commonly held assumptions about seniors are flawed and overlook their innate intelligence and valuable life experience.

 

This ageism must be addressed and some fundamental shifts made in the way we perceive seniors in order for action to be taken to introduce more wellness into senior living.

 

LEARN MORE ABOUT NANCY AND GLOWING OLDER!

• Glowing Older Podcast
• LinkedIn

 

RELATED EPISODES

• Ep. 56: Phone Calls Help Alleviate Loneliness in Nursing Homes
• Ep. 54: What Is The Green House Model?
• Ep. ¬†11: Follow the Scent with Tuli Kraus

Before becoming a serial entrepreneur, Pritma served as a registered nurse for 18 years. This first-hand experience allows her to understand what nurses want and need from employers. 

 

As a nurse, Pritma would sometimes work double shifts that added up to 20 hours a day because of shortages. 

 

In this time of COVID-19, facilities are often understaffed. Nurses are high in-demand and are constantly receiving competing offers of larger salaries and bigger paychecks. 

 

As a result, nurses have become less concerned with money and more with how well they will be cared for by potential employers.  

 

Facilities who want to attract and retain nurses must put more effort into supporting their staff, helping them develop career pathways and supporting their career progression. 

 

Pritma states that this support doesn’t have to cost a lot of money and can be as simple as sitting down to get to know staff and learn where they want to end up on their career journey. 

 

Another idea is the mental health toolkit provided by the American Nurses Association, which is designed to help nurses regulate and monitor their mental health during this stressful time. 

 

In order to recruit nursing staff at all though, it is first necessary to possess an efficient employment method.  

 

Apploi is a unique software which assists with all areas of the employment process and separates truly perfect candidates from the rest of the crowd. 

 

LEARN MORE ABOUT PRITMA AND APPLOI!

• Website
• LinkedIn

 

RELATED EPISODES

• Ep. 42: Healthcare Workers Need Self-Care During Covid-19
• Ep. 39: Administrators Speak Up; Time For a Change!
• Ep. 17: Staffing, Retention and Vendor Relations with 3rd Generation Operator; Mark Kaszirer

As a geriatric social worker and memory coach who's been in the field for twenty years, Rena, knows a lot about memory and particularly how it declines. 

 

She provides a distinction between normal memory loss and abnormal memory loss which impedes daily functioning and is associated with conditions such as dementia and Alzheimer's. 

 

While genetics are often assumed to be the largest predictor of abnormal memory loss, they are in fact, only about one-third of the problem. 

 

Lifestyle, including exercise, diet, sleep, focus, and cognitive stimulation, is a much larger factor in determining whether these types of conditions will develop.

 

Physical exercise prompts Neurogenesis. This is the process by which new brain cells are created. Sugar and other junk food impede this process, therefore it is essential to maintain a healthy diet and drink lots of water. 

 

Sleep is also another huge factor, as is our ability to focus, which we should strive to maintain by refraining from multitasking. 

 

Lastly, cognitive stimulation, including new learning and social stimulation ensures that new brain cells will continue to develop. 

 

Just like any skill, memory can be trained through exercises, techniques, and practice. This is Rena’s area of expertise, and the first step to remembering anything is believing that you can.

 

LEARN MORE ABOUT RENA! 

• Website
• Remembership
• LinkedIn

 

RELATED EPISODES 

• Ep. 59: Advanced Planning and Detailed Conversations
• Ep. 55: Fighting Loneliness With Laughter Yoga
• Ep. 42: Healthcare Workers Need Self-Care During Covid-19

Despite starting off as a nurse and clinical liaison, Steve’s side gig of marketing and content creation soon grew into a full-service agency, Craft Media, of which he remains president. 

Though senior care facilities serve an older clientele, they are really marketing to younger relatives, decision-makers and placement workers in hospitals, and potential employees. 

Steve explains that all of these groups will likely be present on social media and will be influenced by the quality of a nursing home’s social media presence.

In addition, the content will be published online about nursing homes whether they like it or not.  

Failing to maintain their brand through a digital presence will ensure that it is not created by them but by consumers, whose spiteful comments may do great damage to their reputation.

So where does TikTok fit into all of this?

Steve states that, at present, TikTok echoes Instagram’s early days, full of young experimenters and rapidly expanding to eventually become a solid segment of the social media landscape. 

By maintaining a consistent presence on this platform while it is still early days, nursing homes will have a huge advantage in the long run.

FOLLOW STEVE AND CRAFT MEDIA!

• Website
• LinkedIn

RELATED EPISODES

• Ep. 65: Content Marketing In Senior Care
• Ep. 62: Social Media Marketing for Nursing Homes
• Ep. 12: LinkedIn Content Marketing with Shane√© Moret

As the founder of MNT Associates and an experienced long-term care dietitian, Esther Gutman hires, trains, and provides dietitians to long-term care facilities. 

Dietary is often disregarded as glorified catering when, in fact, it is one of the most prominent facets of a facility. 

It is the one area of service that every resident and every family member can understand and look forward to. For this reason, Esther always tries to bring excellent standards to the kitchen. 

In order to fully comprehend the reality of what staff must deal with, dietitians should spend time in the kitchen. This will allow them to make informed orders that staff will be able to carry out. 

Esther states that personality and attitude are 75% of a dietitian's success and they should seek to be team players and establish rapport with staff, especially CNAs.

Obtaining weights may be one of the biggest problems that dietitians face. Rather than dealing with it on their own, they should hold team meetings around weights so everyone can understand the complex issue. 

 

LEARN MORE ABOUT ESTHER AND MEDICAL NUTRITION THERAPY ASSOCIATES!  

• LinkedIn¬†
• Website¬†

 

RELATED EPISODES

• Ep. 49: Better Care Coordination; Real Patient Choice
• Ep. 17: Staffing, Retention and Vendor Relations with 3rd Generation Operator; Mark Kaszirer
• EP. 2: Recruitment and Staffing in Long Term Care with Alvin Kahn