HealthCap would like to congratulate the 2018 Bronze, Silver and Gold AHCA/NCAL Quality Award applicants.  The quality journey is an ongoing process of evaluation and a commitment to achieving success.  Communities who have enjoyed success “live” the Baldrige criteria on a daily basis, everything done within the community is evaluated against this criteria and when necessary, systems are “re-created”.  This may seem like a daunting task but as the old adage says “if it was easy everyone would have it”.  Submitting an application for the Quality Awards is the first step on this journey. It is an exhaustive, interdisciplinary process and we appreciate the efforts!

Well, you aren’t alone! Providers all over the country have been focusing on reducing the number of re-hospitalizations! And what a great goal to have, right? The problem we encounter is that we can’t seem to get a handle on the “why” and the “how” to prevent them.

Long ago and far away nursing centers provided care for frail, elderly patients. There were no IVs, TPN, Cpaps, peritoneal dialysis, active shooters or emergency evacuations. Our biggest threat back then was probably scabies! Those were the days where we “hunkered down”, took what hits us, brushed ourselves off and moved on. Today we are much more enlightened and we should all be thankful for that!

As we continue to soldier through the process of preventing unnecessary re-hospitalizations and nosocomial infections, AHCA/NCAL has partnered with Brown University’s Center for Gerontology to involve members in a proposed study that seeks to evaluate if enhanced environmental cleaning will reduce the rate of infection among patients in skilled nursing centers and ultimately reduce hospitalizations.

Infection control has been a hot-button issue for several years, and many centers have been cited under F441. Are you one of them? Good news! The CDC has developed a tool for evaluating our current processes and identifying if there are any gaps in our protocols. The tool is intended to assist in assessing infection control programs and practices in nursing homes and other long-term care settings.

I don’t know about you but I don’t like small appliances that only do one task. Don’t buy me an appliance if it isn’t multi-functional or I'll return it! So why should reports be any different?

As with anything in life, there is good news and bad news about reports. First, the bad news. We have more reports that tell us more about our centers than we sometimes care to know. CASPER, PB&J, Quality Measures, 5-star, wound logs, fall logs, pharmacy, 24 hour, RUGs/PPS/MDS, weight loss, rehospitalizations, infection control...the list just goes on and on!

If your community is a three- or four-star facility, you may well have it in your DNA to make the leap to five-star status. And if you're a one or two star, maybe it was just bad luck that got you demoted—just a bad survey or an unfortunate resident fall. Hope is a great attribute, but it's not a strategy. As Thomas Jefferson said, “I’m a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.”

So if you want to achieve a five-star rating, you do have an opportunity to do that! Everyone wants to be a five-star, and it should be a real goal. But how can you get there? The truth is that you and your team have to do a thousand things a day (seriously) really well. But the two most critical areas where you can drive results are staffing adequately for acuity and professionally managing adverse events.

Quality is the foundation of the Evolucent Risk Management program, and supporting our members on their quality journey is a tremendously rewarding experience. Over the past six years, Evolucent Risk Management consultants have taken an active role in the AHCA/NCAL National Quality Award program as senior examiners and team leaders.

It's time once again for our members to apply for an award! Applications are due January 26, 2017.

If you work in LTC communities, you understand the frustration and stress caused by adverse events. Quality scores, litigation, and resident safety are obvious concerns. Staff stress levels may increase, and the “blame game” is often an issue. To make matters worse, it can feel like incidents keep happening despite your best efforts. You — and your staff — may feel helpless to stop them.

But are adverse events really inevitable? In many cases, no. While it may seem like falls and other critical events happen without warning, there are often underlying causes that, if identified, could help you prevent these incidents. But how do you determine the root cause of an incident, and what do you do once you have identified it?