As caregivers, nursing home personnel have an obligation to exercise some protective oversight and supervision over their patients. While most nursing home patients do not have access to their own banking or financial records, and cannot send money or charge items, for the few that do it is imperative that facilities be on the lookout for common scams oriented to elders.

Recently my former mother-in-law ...

For patients, employers and payers to make well-informed health care decisions, they must have access to meaningful and easy-to-understand quality and cost data; such transparency is critical to overall health care reform.

Strategies to involve patients and families are essential. Examples of important patient feedback include: 

• An "experience mapping" program that gathers patient perspectives ...

But it doesn't ...

In 2007, Jeffrey Catchmark, associate professor of agricultural and biological engineering in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences, ...

Decisions to terminate employees (whether those are described as firings, terminations, layoffs or the more politically-correct "downsizing") are never fun. They're hard on employees, and they're very hard on managers who may be assuming more duties as a result of losing staff.

When termination decisions are made, they are often made on bases that have little to do with job performance, for example, seniority. The ...

Those who work in long-term care are all too familiar with death. Death is very much a part of life, but those who work in the long-term care environment become quite acquainted with the death and dying process as part of an endemic feature of this type of environment. It is not a pleasant aspect of life, but it is a very real feature of all our lives. 

Yet, we often lose sight that death in ...

The following is a guest blog from Kevin R. McMahon:

Multi facility nursing home organizations have a fairly standard arrangement that centralizes the operating authority over individual nursing facilities in a regional office. The regional office through operational directors oversees the operation of individual facilities. Facility administrators in this arrangement report directly to a regional director.

While ...

A study released last month shows that older adults who don't have much experience using the Internet show changes in their brain activity after only one week online.

These findings, which were presented Oct. 19 at The Society for Neuroscience's annual meeting in Chicago, suggest Internet training can stimulate neural activation patterns and may enhance cognition and brain function in seniors.

To ...

My favorite part of the conference came to a dramatic finish yesterday afternoon, as the winners of the food and design challenges were announced on the exhibit hall floor.

After very competitive opening rounds, Team Aramark and Team Mather faced off in the Chef Challenge finals on Wednesday, having to work with the secret ingredient chocolate. In the end, Chefs Chip Fegert and Chivo Montero from Team ...

AAHSA honored several individuals and LTC communities in this morning's general session. It's always important to take time out to recognize those who go the extra mile in caring for seniors.

Award of Honor: David Ferguson, President and CEO, American Baptists Homes of the West, Pleasanton, Calif.

Excellence in Leadership: Gary Puma, President and CEO, PHS Senior Living, Princeton, N.J.

Leading Edge ...

My first day at AAHSA has been a whirlwind, with so much to see and do in the lecture halls and on the exhibit hall floor! A big hit last year, the Chef Challenge and Last Designer Standing competitions are in full swing. New this year is the AAHSA Idea House, which showcases aging-in-place technology and sustainability.

Stay tuned for a slide show ...

The following is a guest blog from Anthony Cirillo:  

In his latest book Warren Bennis raises questions about the nature of leadership. He asks, "Can a leader both act and be real?" Bill George, a professor at the Harvard Business School, in his book True North, contends that a "journey to leadership" cannot be made without "framing your life story, discerning your passions, finding your leadership ...

One thing soldiers with recent combat experience say is that frequently it's the non-combatants who suffer the worst in battle. This is something like the observation my daughter, a pediatrician, makes about working in the ER:  it's the innocent bystanders that are always hurt the worst.

The same is true when end-of-life issues clash with expectancies arising from a parent's wealth. Issues usually ...

The nursing home, being predominately a medical environment, relies overwhelming on pharmacology for addressing issues of pain management. However, as I have mentioned in previous articles, pain is more than just a biological issue. The subjective nature of the pain response, and the psychology of the individual, too often fails to be adequately considered in pain management. 

More can be done ...

We all know that washing our hands is the best way to guard against the spread of germs. But there are several other measures that can also help protect us from contamination.

 In this Washington Post article, health care professionals share some other tips on how they stop ...

Nearly every nursing home has labor problems related to getting and keeping good staff members. Good help is exceptionally hard to find. Good-hearted nurses and aides, who are willing to work long hours under difficult conditions are often hard to find.  Too many employees means the bottom line of the facility suffers. Too few and sanctions and state citations can result.  Sometimes the line ...

A new study from PHI, a national non-profit organization working to strengthen the health care services workforce, reveals that less than one-fifth of Massachusetts direct-care workers (nursing home assistants, home health care aides and personal care attendants) are enrolled in employer-sponsored health insurance plans.

The primarily reason for the lapse in coverage is that it's too costly. The study ...

While health care reform has long been a topic of discussion in Washington, D.C., it has become a leading policy issue for the Obama Administration and Congress. Health care reform is no longer perceived as peripheral to our larger economic condition. Instead, it is viewed as an integral element to our long term economic stability as a nation.

As lawmakers debate health care reform proposals, it is ...

The CDC is just beginning to understand why so little H1N1 virus is available to Americans in need, reports National Public Radio. First, vaccine manufacturers didn't have the reagents to know how much active ingredient was in production. When they finally got them, they learned that they had far less than they thought. Then machine glitches caused a bottleneck in packaging. Next up, some vaccine manufacturers have ...

Kimberly Broffman is the little girl at the center of it all. She lives in the retirement community with grandparents Jimmy and Judie Stottler because they are her legal guardians.

The community's homeowner's association wants Broffman out because the bylaws of the community ...

Two new studies from The New England Journal of Medicine indicate that nursing home residents may be receiving futile care measures at the end of their lives.

In one study, doctors examined health records of 3,702 nursing-home residents across the nation who started dialysis between 1998 and 2000. While the average age was 73, many had other health ...

With the H1N1 virus lurking in our office (so far, one confirmed case), experts agree that aside from vaccination, the best defense is thorough handwashing. Check out this video from the Washington Post that shows proper handwashing technique.

We hear these messages all ...