Establishing processes to utilize root cause analysis for quality improvement is necessary, but it takes discipline. One of the first steps is to challenge your own beliefs about safety and quality failures.
Are your Ultra High RUGs putting you at risk?
By
Steven Littlehale
Feb 22, 2016
The 2016 Office of Inspector General work plan calls for increased scrutiny of the Ultra High therapy billing category because the amount of this therapy delivered has increased over time, despite resident...
What the NLRB’s new ambush election rules mean for you
By
Woodruff Imberman Ph.D.
Jan 28, 2015
Long-term care facilities, ranging from independent living communities to post-acute care and rehab centers, all will face new problems avoiding unions because of the recently issued National Labor Relations...
Better together
By
Gary Tetz
Nov 30, 2023
An hour or so before the siren in our long-term care factory blasted the official start of the work day, and feeling a heightened level of job-related stress, I strolled into a colleague’s office uninvited...
Special project brings children, nursing home residents together
By
Janet Listokin
Apr 13, 2009
Isabella Geriatric Center in New York City helps bridge the gap between children and nursing home residents with a special intergenerational program.
Alarm management in a long-term care environment
By
Connie Dills and Jeanne Venella
Feb 19, 2016
The number of non-actionable alarms blaring daily — due to a tightly set alarm parameter or a patient talking/coughing or getting out of bed — was distracting to clinical staff and disruptive to patients.
Sorting out the antipsychotic quality measures
By
Steven Littlehale
Mar 05, 2013
While antipsychotic measurements can vary, providers must carefully and thoroughly examine all antipsychotic medication use in their facility.
‘Life is frustrating’: Living in a retirement community under COVID-19 restrictions
By
James T. Berger
Apr 06, 2020
I am a professional journalist who makes his living as a marketing consultant and freelance writer. I am also an independent living resident of a continuing care retirement community, Covenant Living of...
Making email matter
By
Jean Wendland Porter
May 01, 2019
ALL emails are good because communication is good, but some could be clearer and communicate more thoroughly and competently what you want to say.
When two midnights doesn’t equal three days
By
Carol Levine
Sep 23, 2013
Hospital observation stays have been increasing, as have Medicare auditors’ denial of claims related to short inpatient stays on the basis that they should have been counted as observation stays....