Nursing Home Administration - Assignment Example

?Why is it important that the administrator, medical director and the director of nursing to have a good and transparent relationship between each other? In medical and nursing homes, normally, there are three distinctive leadership roles provided at the nursing home in order to ensure the smooth running of the medical operations at the nursing home. Each leadership role is tasked with distinctive responsibilities in order to ensure the nursing home medical operations are smooth and well coordinated. These medical positions are: A medical administrator This is a person who serves the primary role of all the administrative functions involved in a nursing home. He is normally the key advisor to the senior most leaders like the chairperson and the vice-chair person of a nursing home. His general responsibilities include the provision of the managerial as well as the business administrative affairs of a nursing home. He also helps to budget, providing expertise in the medical fields related to finance, providing strategic plans, collection of the revenue as well as expense controlling, heading the human resource department, program developments, research grant administration, space maintenance, managing information systems as well as the contract agreements with the stakeholders of the nursing home. He also provides leadership to the nursing home in the event that the chair and the vice of the nursing home are not available to discharge their administrative functions to the nursing. Medical director This is a person who helps to provide a medical perspective expertise in the medical field of the therapeutic applications as well as the renal products applications. He plays a key role in the provision of the reviewing as well as the oversight services in the clinical matters regarding the new product development of the nursing home (Polifko-Harris, 2004). In addition, he helps to play the role of the life cycle management in a nursing home as well as the product organization support. Additionally, he also functions as the subject matter to the development of the operations in the clinical matters including the study execution, the trial development protocol, the clinical study reports as well as the preparation of the necessary clinical materials to help in the clinical support regulatory submissions of a nursing home. Moreover, he also functions to provide the consultancy services to a nursing home in order to help in the engineering of the functions that help to support the label changes of a nursing home, provision of the pharmaceutical vigilance services, the nursing home risk assessment as well as the evaluation of the nursing home product complaints (Booyens, 2004). Director of nursing This is a person is involved in the supervision of all the nursing personnel at a nursing home as well as establishing the necessary required nursing standards in a nursing home and how they can be maintained for a long time. He also provides the responsibility and accountability services required for nursing services. In addition, he advices the CEO, the HR, COO, the clinical managers as well as the medical staff in relation to the medical nursing services. Additionally he consults with the medical director in regard to the clinical issues that might emerge from a nursing home. Additionally, a director of nursing is responsible for the completion of the special medical assignments in a nursing home as assigned by the medical director as well as the implementation of the medical reports. Moreover, the director of nursing participates in the interviewing process of the medical staff. Furthermore, he participates in the planning, the implementation, as well as the evaluation of the nursing home programs and services. However, there are occurrences of some health cases in a nursing home that might end up causing the roles of each of the above officers to overlap. Such a scenario is so despicable to speak since the officers might end up engaging themselves in supremacy battles at the nursing home; causing many conflicts in the process. For example, almost all the roles of the medical administrator overlap with those of the director of nursing. Some particular examples of the overlap of the roles for both is that both officers can advice the senior leaders of a nursing home over which action to take about the nursing home (Kelly, 2012). Consequently, they both are involved in managerial tasks at the nursing home and they both plan for research and development of a nursing home; yet the director of nursing is answerable to the medical director while the administrator is not! However, since the roles of the administrator seem to encompass a wider field in the roles of the clinical matters, he needs to strategies by dividing the particular roles where they seem to overlap between the officers. He can split the roles where one party takes one half while the other party takes the remaining part- particularly for him and the director of financing; while at the same time, ensuring that the director of financing consults with the medical director constantly so as to minimize conflicts at the nursing home. However, it is important for the medical administrator to always know that his medical judgments might not always be right and he needs to constantly consult too with the rest of his officers. Why should a medical administrator do everything possible to create a “person centered care” nursing facility? A person centered care is a medical care to a patient that involves a collaborative effort that consists of the patient himself, his family and friends, doctors as well as other health professionals that might be involved to provide a comprehensive healthcare system to the patients. The patient is provided with some basic healthcare education as well as a collaborative effort of the health care professionals working as a team in order to share knowledge as well as working towards a common goal of the complete healing and patient health recovery. It is the most congruent medical care method and is quite responsive to the personal needs of a patient. A person-centered care is different from the traditional nursing homes in that person care is more focused on the personal needs of the patient involved (Adams & Grieder, 2005). It is a more humanistic nursing approach to a patient developed through a closer relationship of trust and comfort between the nurse and the patient. In addition, the medical nurse knows the complete biography of the patient involved; while basing on an older person’s knowledge about the health values. In addition, unlike the traditional nursing homes where a nurse used to provide his/ her medical health knowledge while taking care of his/ her patients, person centered care respects the personal contribution of the patient himself to improve his own health including his goals, past experiences, values as well as the knowledge they have concerning their own health. In addition, person centered care is very beneficial to residents since the nursing service values their personal values they might be having concerning their health. Additionally, involving the whole family of a patient as well as his friends helps the patient to recover even faster. Moreover, it helps to increase the level of trust between a nurse and his patient. An example of a nursing home that has adopted this method is the Montefiore Medical Center in New York. Why is it important for a nursing home to provide all the residents with personal satisfaction, social contacts, as well as the recreational gratification in the activities of the medical program rather than resorting to the modern way of using “bingo” and “TVs” as major medical contents activities? It is important for a nursing home to provide all the residents with personal satisfaction because residents usually attach importance on their freedom of choice. The control over their personal matters like the bedtime, roommates, rising times, use of money, care routines, the use of the telephone services, initiating contacts with a personal doctor as well as taking trips out of the nursing home come in handy in the recovery/ stay in the homes (Nightingale, 2010). Some little of personal freedom usually guarantees a quick recovery of a patient in the end as opposed to a complete lack of freedom. In addition, having social contacts is very important since so many patients across the world normally attribute their quick health recovery to the meeting and socializing with their family members as well as friends. They help to encourage a person to recover faster (Nightingale, 2010). Moreover, recreational gratification of the medical program helps the medical patients to do some exercises that will help to keep their bodies healthy and energized all the time. The recreational activities also help in keeping the body fit due to the intensive exercises a patient might subject him/ herself to as opposed to just sitting at one place to watch TV and play bingo. A nursing home that provides a comprehensive activity program helps the patients to always stay fit by undertaking some regular exercises of the patients who in the long run will start noticing some improvements of their health hence leading to a better resident clinical outcome. An example of a nursing home in New York that provides its patients with the above services is the First Care of New York, Inc. In all of the three medical facilities provided for you on the question, which medical facility would you pick to become its medical administrator as my first job from the rest and why? I would settle for facility (A). This is because unlike the rest of the medical facilities, facility (A) tends to have the basic facilities that can help me run the activities of a nursing home smoothly at my first time job as a medical administrator. Despite the fact that the nursing home has been experiencing a low administrator turnover rate for the past five years as well as the salary and medical benefits being way below average, the nursing home is not on a verge of collapsing (Longman, 2012). The rest of the departments are doing quite well like having a firm financial standing, having a good DOH survey, has a solid reputation in the community and the employee morale is very high. This is a nursing home that can assure me of offering my medical administrative services for a long time unlike the rest and hence will employ the necessary administrative strategies that will help to make the nursing home to become profitable again since the employee morale is already high. If the nursing home resurfaces again in its profitability, we as the medical team might consider then to improve the turnover rate of the nursing home as well as improving our salaries and benefits the nursing home could possibly offer us. What is the major difference in the survey process (QIS versus Traditional)? The major difference in the survey process of the QIS method versus the traditional survey process method is that, QIS is a staged nursing home surveying process for both the objective and systematic survey methods that help to focus on only some few selected areas of interest. For further review, once the very preliminary comprehensive reconnaissance period is over while the traditional method is a complete opposite. The survey method is not staged for the traditional method (Allen, 2011). The nursing homes that are normally surveyed using the QIS method are normally at more risks of more deficiencies since the survey process is just biased in nature and the surveyor might end up surveying for things that he only has interest in leaving out a ton of important information that needs to be surveyed too. However, the nursing homes are adapting to the new process of the QIS method of survey by conducting the surveys under very realistic conditions with the same pressures of survey, achieving of the objectives of the survey process as well as an improved accuracy and consistency of the survey results. Why do you think the Affordable Care Act (ACA) of the Obama care is so controversial? The affordable Care Act (ACA) is an American healthcare reform and legislation that proposes to increase the availability, affordability, quality of the public as well as the private health insurance system to the over 44 million uninsured Americans that helps to curb the increasing growth in healthcare spending by the Americans (Gruber & Newquist, 2011). The healthcare provisions propose a stop to the dropping of clients should their clients fall sick and expand the Medicaid so that the low-income earners are able to access their healthcare services at an affordable rate. However, the bill is very controversial at the same time. It proposes that companies should refuse to provide the female employees with the contraceptive care on grounds that it violates their religious freedom! This begs the question; do companies have the right of objecting to laws on religious grounds? The answer is no. So, supposing the bill is ascended into law, how will companies be supporting their female employees with their contraceptive services? A lot remains to be desired with the controversial bill. (a) What is the definition and description of the following diagnosis? (b) Why is an individual with this kind of ailment better off in a nursing home than in another setting of an assisted living facility like home, hospital, or apartment? (1.) Tube feedings Tube feedings are the feedings that are used to feed a patient when they cannot eat. They are normally administered through the nasogastric tube and directly into the stomach and sometimes the intestine in order to provide the needed food energy required for the healing process. An individual suffering from this ailment is better off in a nursing home than at any other place including a hospital since they require a very specialized care an attention that only a nurse can provide. (2.) Cerebra Vascular Accident (CVA) A Cerebrum Vascular Accident is also known as stroke and is medical condition where there is a rapid loss of the brain function due to the turbulence in the blood delivery to the brain of an individual. It could result from either a blockage of a blood vein or excessive hemorrhage. Therefore, the stricken area of the brain cannot be under utility appropriately, which becomes apparent in the paralyzing of a half part of the body or some limbs of the body and in some cases the ability understand, formulate speech or rather the inability to see. A patient like this needs a specialized attention of a medical nurse who can help to take care of the patient better at a nursing home. (3.) Parkinson’s disease This is a progressive disease of the human nervous system and is usually marked by the muscular rigidity, tremor as well as slow and non-precise body movements. It mostly affects the middle-aged to the elderly people as a result of the degeneration of the brain part known as the basal ganglia as well as a deficiency of the neurotransmitter dopamine. A person suffering from this disease is better off placed at a nursing home where a medical nurse can give him/ her some special medical care to help manage the illness. (4.) Alzheimer’s / Dementia This type of disease causes problems with the thinking, memory as well as the behavior of a person. It also causes the memory loss of a person as well as loosing the intellectual capabilities of a person that interferes with the daily life of an individual. Eventually, it leads to the death of a patient. A patient suffering from this disease requires some professional nursing services and that is why such a patient is better placed at a nursing home. (5.) Wondering episodes It is a disease that is characterized by a reversible amnesia of a personal identity including personality, memories as well as anything that identifies the characteristics of an individual. Depending on a patient, the state might be short-lived to prolonging into months. It involves unplanned travelling together with an establishment of a new identity. Such a patient needs a specialized nursing services and that is why they are better placed at a nursing home so that the nurses can help them recover quickly from their wandering state. Reference Allen, J. E. (2011). Nursing home federal requirements: Guidelines to surveyors and survey protocols. New York: Springer Pub. Co. Gruber, J., & Newquist, H. P. (2011). Health care reform: What it is, why it's necessary, how it works. New York: Hill and Wang. Factor, S. A., & Weiner, W. J. (2008). Parkinson's disease: Diagnosis and clinical management. New York: Demos. Nightingale, F. (2010). Notes on nursing. Lexington, KY: ReadaClassic.com. Longman, P. (2012). Best care anywhere: Why VA health care would work better for everyone. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Adams, N., & Grieder, D. (2005). Treatment planning for person-centered care: The road to mental health and addiction recovery : mapping the journey for individuals, families and providers. Bulington, MA: Elsevier Academic Press. Booyens, S. W. (2004). Dimensions of nursing management. Landsdowne, Virg: Juta Kelly, P. (2012). Nursing leadership & management. Clifton Park, NY: Cengage Learning. Polifko-Harris, K. (2004). Case applications in nursing leadership & management. Clifton Park, N.Y: Thomson/Delmar Learning. Read More