As they drove in through the gates, the team of three state surveyors sensed that something was amiss. They parked and walked towards the front door. Their concern mounted as they noted the strange silence and the absence of any human or animal presence. Then they saw the big sign on the door: “Gone Camping!”

A dear friend of mine was recently admitted to hospice. In the course of discussing my friend’s care, I asked her nurse how long she had been a hospice nurse.

“Fourteen years,” she said.

“Well, then, you must love it,” I responded.  

Already faced with the prospect of absorbing $127 billion in Medicare funding reductions through 2021, the long-term care industry may find itself confronted with even more strife in the year ahead.

Ask wound care nurses in the LTC setting how they do their jobs and they’ll likely respond, “It’s all about getting more done with less.” Financial pressures, along with MDS 3.0 and other compliance and regulatory initiatives, are intensifying scrutiny of wound care practices.

In the following article, wound care nurses from three facilities share how the use of an electronic point-of-care documentation system is transforming their jobs and enabling them to achieve better outcomes.

EMERGING FROM A SEA OF PAPER

The Cathedral Square Corporation has advice for those providers who want to participate in the evolving nature of healthcare delivery: Get educated, get involved—and quickly, otherwise the industry may move on without you.

We’ve heard the rumblings of the coming generation in the voices of our “young” residents in their 50s and 60s. It’s the younger residents who most often chafe at the restrictions of nursing home life, such as being unable to leave the facility unsupervised, or being cautioned to sit when they’d prefer to walk and take the risk of falling.

The holiday season can certainly be a wonderful time of year full of celebrations—and decorations—at senior housing properties.

The stability in nursing care fundamentals continues as occupancy has remained essentially flat. In 3Q11, nursing care occupancy was 88.3 percent, which is unchanged from the prior quarter and consistent with where occupancy has oscillated in the past year.

Absorption continued to post modest declines, with the number of occupied units decreasing by 0.2 percent in 3Q11. While absorption trended negatively, the number of operational beds also declined by 0.2 percent—on par with absorption, resulting in unchanging occupancy.