I am new to long-term care and notice many residents are on numerous medications. Are there any resources besides the poison control number to use if a nurse is needed to find a medication or a group of medications fast?
We have several residents who are consistently getting bruises on their arms from completing their ADLs or bumping into something. Even when rubbing on lotions, or scratching an itch on their arm, they give themselves a skin tear. Any suggestions to help protect some of these arms, or to keep the pickers from picking at…
I am trying to encourage some of my newly hired nurses who definitely show the early signs of becoming a great leader. Do you have any tips? With the average age of the RN being near retirement age in the next few years, every nurse really needs to recruit someone into nursing. I would suggest…
We always have difficulty getting extra fluids into our residents during these hot summer and fall months, any suggestions? Getting fluids into elderly residents is something my facility struggled with every summer and fall. We started by asking activities to serve small cups of juice or water. Some of the activities staff have wonderful relationships…
As a new DON, I have instructed my staff to remove, rinse and reuse colostomy bags. Do you agree? As a person who has a colostomy, I do not agree with reusing bags. I choose to use a one-piece system. Therefore, I empty my pouch and flush what I have emptied. I use a baby…
We are having an outbreak of Candida auris in my facility. Is this a problem in other skilled care facilities? Candidemia, a bloodstream infection with Candida, is a common infection in hospitalized patients. Unlike Candida infections in the mouth and throat (also called “thrush”) or vaginal “yeast infections,” invasive candidiasis is a serious infection that…
Nursing care documentation has been influential but hasn’t driven payment to the degree it will October 1.
As a new nurse leader, what can I do to support my facility’s nurses? I don’t have a budget for this. I totally get what you are asking, and it is a proven fact that nurses who feel supported have less turnover, and less turnover produces a higher quality of care for the residents under…
QPP stands for Quality Payment Program, which is a new program from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services for billing based on quality measures and reaching benchmarks and facility performance.
There is a whole open can of worms concerning photos, with some corporations wanting photos of everything, and some forbidding photos.
