Telehealth, smartphone

Virtually shadowing and educating skilled nursing facility employees can boost geriatrics expertise among staffers, a new study finds.

SNF caregivers often lack the needed background and skills to care for complex residents, note experts with the University of Chicago. To assist, they piloted the use of remote coaching at several Southside facilities and found statistically significant increases in their self-efficacy to treat patients with dementia, educate patients about hospice and palliative medicine, and manage infections in seniors, according to the study, published in April’s Geriatric Nursing.

“This is a great way to provide training to a staff that is oftentimes highly in need of additional training in a way that can be accomplished without disrupting their workflow overly much,” Katherine Thompson, M.D., study co-author and a geriatrician at the University of Chicago, told McKnight’s. She noted that SNF social workers and nurses are often “under-trained” and “overwhelmed.”

Researchers used the Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes (ECHO) platform to teach staffers in spring 2017 about geriatric care principles. ECHO gives mentoring and consultation through a secure, web-based videoconferencing technology, linking caregivers with academic medical experts. Authors emphasized that the technology is not a webinar.

Participants filled out surveys before and after the pilot, showing an improvement in geriatric know-how following the test. The two biggest barriers to using their learnings in practice were the time pressures of caring for complex geriatric patients, and staff available to assist with social support needs, the survey found.