Focus on life safety during the management of COVID-19
By
Stan Szpytek
Mar 24, 2020
Note: This story was updated on May 12 to reflect new regulatory changes. As skilled nursing facilities around the nation rise to the challenges of managing this current infectious disease outbreak, providers...
The importance of social distancing in a post-COVID 19 world
By
Carol Winner
Jun 29, 2020
We are living in a once-in-a-lifetime period in history in which we are targeted by a virus that takes no prisoners. It wants to destroy all in its path especially the elderly and those who work in...
Better access to better PPE is critical for long-term care providers
By
Stephen Bird
Dec 14, 2021
Last month the National Personal Protective Technology Laboratory, a division of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), issued a request for information soliciting “public...
Moment of truth
By
Gary Tetz
Dec 10, 2020
Now that vaccines really are imminent and long-term care staff and residents look to be first in line, you’re probably holding your breath, desperately longing for an answer to the most important question...
You have the answers to this COVID-19 test. But will you let yourself pass?
By
James M. Berklan
Apr 10, 2020
If you haven’t yet, you could soon be facing your toughest “grader” in this anxious pandemic era. But you don’t have to do it unarmed.
Managing a bah humbug holiday season
By
Eleanor Feldman Barbera, Ph.D.
Dec 15, 2020
By now many of us have viewed the viral video of residents gleefully shooting soft foam balls at laughing staff members dressed as reindeer dodging through a pine-tree “forest.” It’s the kind...
Designing a 2021 resident engagement blueprint
By
Charles de Vilmorin
Nov 30, 2020
Eight months into the global COVID-19 pandemic, it is clear that residents of nursing homes and senior living communities are experiencing rapid declines in physical and cognitive health as a result of...
The solution to nursing homes’ COVID-19 testing shortages
By
James M. Berklan
Aug 14, 2020
Fret no more. I’ve figured out how to get plenty of COVID-19 testing to take place at nursing homes. The federal government may have wished for more testing of residents and workers, but my plan has...
With POC testing strategy, federal government continues to respond poorly to COVID-19 in nursing homes
By
Brendan Williams
Sep 08, 2020
In the federal government’s fight against COVID-19, nursing homes have effectively been left for dead. Despite a death count that began with the February outbreak in a Kirkland, Washington, nursing...
Almost done
By
Gary Tetz
Feb 04, 2021
“Almost done,” the doctor assured me, as she aimed her laser at my right eye. Then over the next 20 minutes, she said it several more times. By then I knew it was all a cruel deception, meant to distract...