May 01, 2013
I'm not going to worry too much about the Second Annual McKnight's Technology Awards program, which kicks off this month. The first one last year was a smashing success. I have no reason to believe there are any fewer proud and successful programs out there this year.
April 01, 2013
There are plenty of legal concerns that keep nursing home administrators awake at night. Many times, the demons can be kept under the bed or locked in the closet. But not always.
March 01, 2013
If you're like me, you're a big believer in the saying "Attitude determines altitude." Eldercare professionals should have this embedded in their minds — for their good and the benefit of those they care for.
February 01, 2013
It's no wonder you, as a long-term care provider, might get fed up with the general media. Sometimes it has to seem that mass media journalists must sit around the office, wondering what they can do to score flash points with editors, plaintiff lawyers and talk shows.
January 01, 2013
I'm fascinated with long-term care topics that at first blush seem to be speaking about residents, but upon closer reflection they could be even more interesting personally to long-term care professionals.
December 01, 2012
By the time December rolls around, it's safe to say many thoughts are toward finishing the year on a high note. Or for pragmatists and forward-thinkers, setting up strongly for the flip of the calendar page.
November 01, 2012
Not all association conventions are remembered equally. Some have dynamite entertainment, some a few great speakers. Often, it doesn't go much beyond that.
October 01, 2012
When you move workspaces, there are endless unexpected discoveries. Some depress, some thrill, some just boggle the mind.
September 01, 2012
Long-term care providers might find they have some wrenching decisions to make, thanks to the Romney-Ryan presidential ticket.
August 01, 2012
In case you had not checked lately, you're liable to be paying more than ever just to run your basic eldercare business.
July 02, 2012
Mark Parkinson makes a lot of sense when he talks about the future of long-term care. One of his key points is that providers must be the cost and quality solution.
June 04, 2012
Do you and your colleagues do good work? Of course you do. But why is that? You care for your residents. Check. You care about professionalism. Check. Maybe you just don't know any other way. Check.
May 01, 2012
Even in generosity, it seems, nursing home leaders can't catch a break. The headlines, from the Washington Post to the Huffington Post, implied as much. There they were in bold, tall type, touting the fact that a "nursing home group" had donated $175,000 toward Sen. Orrin Hatch's (R-UT) re-election effort.
April 02, 2012
If you feel like you've been bombarded with antipsychotic news lately, it's not in your imagination. People inside and outside of long-term care alike have been feeling the pressure to lessen antipsychotics' use in what has become a hot-button issue.
March 01, 2012
If long-term care providers (and their residents and families) needed any more depressing confirmation that they are not on the presidential radar screen, they've gotten it full-blast recently.
February 01, 2012
With warmer days of spring around the corner, now is the perfect time to hunker down and get your professional affairs in order. I have a solution that involves no paperwork or heavy lifting.
January 03, 2012
Sometimes long-term care nurses feel like step-sisters to their acute-care counterparts. Face it: Hospital nurses usually get the glory.
November 29, 2011
It was both flattering and intimidating. At the LeadingAge convention, someone asked me to state my hopes for the future of long-term care. What a thrill to be asked, but with all the possibilities, where should one start?
November 01, 2011
Hopefully a certain bound-to-be viral video has already gotten to you. If not, you can thank me later.
October 01, 2011
So this is what it comes to when No. 1 attempts to buy No. 2. This could be some lively theater by the time the final curtain drops.
September 01, 2011
If you thought the politicians' recent stomach-turning brinksmanship over the national debt ceiling wasn't fun — and who did? — you have no reason to look forward to the end of November and December.
August 02, 2011
"Eye-opening" is the only way to describe results of a new study by Brown University researchers into eldercare usage patterns. In brief, they found that minority residents have been entering nursing homes at a higher rate than in previous decades.
July 01, 2011
The Hebrew Rehabilitation Center in Boston ought to be getting a lot more attention from the profession. The center has successfully implemented a program that reduces rehospitalization rates.
June 01, 2011
I haven't heard them pronounced this way yet, but long-term care providers might want to consider it when it comes to ACOs. Instead of spelling it out, as in A-C-O, say it phonetically, as in "Ache-O."
May 02, 2011
News that nursing home ratings would be frozen on the federal website for consumer research for six months drew a lot of interest from providers when regulators' plans were announced this spring. And it should have.
April 01, 2011
The saga of Donald Berwick as administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has taken a number of interesting, if not sadly predictable, turns lately. Opponents of his patron, President Obama, are demanding Berwick's head. Why? Because they can.
March 01, 2011
When it comes to running a business, you better evolve. If you don't, trouble will surely find you. Maybe it will even if you do.
February 01, 2011
We're back and better than ever. That familiar, proud phrase is the first thing that popped into my mind as I wondered how I would approach this month's column topic. There's really no other way to put it.
January 03, 2011
We're into January now so that means one of two things, if you're like me: You've either already broken your New Year's resolutions, or you're about ready to.
December 01, 2010
I don't know about you, but when I go to a store and hand over my money or credit card, I expect to get something in return. If I go into McDonald's, I expect giving up $1 and change is going to get me something that is going to quench my thirst for a while. Call it one of the most obvious natural laws of commerce: I pay, you give.
December 01, 2010
If there is one group of people who have earned the right to be cynical, it is long-term care professionals. Coming from a journalist, this is no underqualified assessment.
November 01, 2010
If there is one group of people who have earned the right to be cynical, it is long-term care professionals. Coming from a journalist, this is no underqualified assessment.
October 01, 2010
AHCA president and CEO Bruce Yarwood's announced successor, current Kansas Gov. Mark Parkinson, is probably getting more scrutiny than usual by friends and observers of AHCA.
September 01, 2010
The greatest college basketball coach of all time, John Wooden, said it best: Don't let what you cannot do stop you from doing what you can do.
August 01, 2010
Those rumblings you might have felt recently from the West Coast had nothing to do with earthquakes. They're the stuff of potential nightmares if you're a nursing home operator.
July 01, 2010
Within one week recently, I learned just how creative and clever long-term care workers can be.
June 01, 2010
It's said if you really want to learn something, teach it. Let's hope that's true.
May 01, 2010
On April 20, top management from the Covenant Care nursing facility were in Washington to become the first healthcare provider of any type to win the Better Business Bureau International Torch Award for Marketplace Excellence.
April 01, 2010
Some things are incomprehensible in their entirety. That is my initial thought as I write on the day President Obama signed historic healthcare reform into law.
March 01, 2010
I'm a big believer in the saying "Attitude determines altitude."
February 01, 2010
After a two-month, health-related absence, AHCA's Bruce Yarwood seems back on the road to a virtually full recovery.
January 01, 2010
McKnight's fourth annual Online Expo is an offer you can't refuse.
December 01, 2009
You better believe healthcare reform would be important to the long-term care community, no matter how many or few times the phrase "long-term care" might actually appear in any Congressional action.
November 01, 2009
The 2010 National Skilled Nursing Investment Forum is an idea that has been staring us in the face for numerous years.
October 01, 2009
I have to admit I wasn't really ready for the outpouring we received over hospice care.
September 01, 2009
We can forgive providers if they sense a bit of vertigo coming on. When legislators look to give back power, up truly must seem like down and down seem like up.
August 01, 2009
I thought of the parable of the rabbit and the snake when contemplating the flurry of healthcare reform banter taking place before U.S. lawmakers' August recess.
July 01, 2009
If there were ever any doubts that the "culture change" we've all heard so much about in recent years was really going to take hold, it's time to put them to rest.
June 01, 2009
The website you are viewing has just been awarded Best Online News Section for the second year in a row by the annual ASHPE Awards.
May 01, 2009
Little things like pirates taking Americans hostage off the coast of Africa, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and the credit and housing markets crises have knocked long-term care out of the evening newscast, but if someone had looked closely, my, what drama they could find...
