Effective Communication Strategies For Nursing Professionals In Short-Term Rehab And Long-Term Care Essay.

The communication strategies practiced by the nurses should be based on the core values and principles of empathy, patience and love.  As commented by Kuys et al. (2014), listening more than communicating often helps in the development of better and understanding relationships between the care attendant and the support user.

Population

The population being addressed over here is the adult population within a skilled nursing facility. The patient populations here have been receiving short-term rehab and long-term care services. The western world has been going bounty with the idea of short-term rehab and long-term care in health care services.  The main ideology behind the promotion of short-term rehab centers is to promote independent living in the old age group. The scenario addressed over here is skilled nursing facilities, which are adept at providing long-term care to senior citizens suffering from prolonged illness.

                                            Table 1: Performance data scorecard

                                                            (Source: Author)

The performance data scorecard consists of a number of parameters such as –performance, quality, safety, employee engagement. These parameters contribute towards the continuous improvement of the organizational processes that influence the quality of patient care. These have been further discussed with respect to each key indicator.

One of the key performance indicators which have been discussed over is effective communication aspects within a care setup. The communication strategies practiced by the nurses should be based on the core values and principles of empathy, patience and love.  As commented by Kuys et al. (2014), listening more than communicating often helps in the development of better and understanding relationships between the care attendant and the support user.

Therefore, for improving the performance of nursing professionals looking after older adults in short-term rehab, active listening and empathetic communication skills need to be practiced. Thus, implementation of effective communication and listening skills help in the settlement of ethical dilemmas, which often arise due to difference of opinion between a nursing professional and the patient (Bagshaw et al., 2014).

The qualities of support services offered within a rehab are dependent upon two major factors such as skills and technology (Silva, Eslick & Duque, 2013). In this respect, for offering long-term care effective medical interventions need to be provided to the patients. Thus, much of the interventions are based upon appropriate diagnosis. Therefore, there is a need to lay emphasis upon the inculcation of skilled professionals who are able to handle or manage diagnostic tools for investigation of the current health situation of the patient.

The safety of the patients is placed at the centre of the care services by reducing the fall rate risk among the adult patient population.  This could be ensured by implementation of fall risk assessment tools, where scores are provided to individuals to access the probability of their meeting with accidents.   Additionally focusing on the ergonomics of the hospital can also reduce the chances of accidents (Verleye, Gemmel & Rangarajan, 2014).

The recruitment of the nursing professionals trained under certified bodies helps in the enhancement of the standard of the services. Additional screening process during recruitment also helps in appropriate staff selection. For the process of sufficient and effective engagement of employees within the nursing home, a number of measures could be taken such providing performance bonus and incentives to the nursing staff along with sufficient training.

Performance Data Scorecard

In this respect, some of the measures which could promote employee engagement within an organization are taking responsibility or accountability for the mistakes or the wrong done. This could serve as a positive example for the junior nurses or subordinates where they would learn to be more responsible towards their client. As commented by Fiabane, Giorgi, Sguazzin & Argentero (2013), a well-engaged staff has better chances of doing well at their place of work compared to a disengaged staff.  

The performance scorecards cover the organization’s financial objectives and help the manager in tracking the financial success and shareholder value.

The perspectives such as customer satisfaction and market share goals help in the brand imaging and positioning of the organization. Additionally, the objectives of customer satisfaction help in the establishment of long-term care.

The balanced scorecard provides a powerful framework for strategic planning and helps in establishment of cause and effect relationship.  As commented by Crawford, Rich, Buckman & Bergeron (2014), follows such a strategic framework help in the communicating performance report better than organizations without such structure.

The healthcare agencies are concerned with the employment of strategies and programs that drives positive patient experience along with overall customer satisfaction. Some of the marketing gimmicks which have been applied over here are mystery shopping, which has garnered positive results in studying the perspectives of the patient population. The goal is to ‘step in the shoes’ of the patient. Here, the healthcare industry is turning into secret shoppers for getting a better view of ideologies possessed by the patients. As commented by White, Wells & Butterworth (2014), reports from mystery shoppers have led to changes in patient care and experiences such as better explanation of medical procedures.

The culture and development of environment where staffs could feel free to ask questions pertaining to the organizational processes are welcome. This helps in development of mutual admiration between the staff and the organization. As commented by Collini, Guidroz & Perez (2015), reflective retrospection like this helps in addressing the organizational loopholes.

In this respect, further study and analysis have highlighted that a well-engaged employee can help in the expansion of the organizational objectives. As commented by Al-Balushi et al. (2014), through the employment of proper employment engagement policies the productivity of the organization can be increased.

The employee engagement within an organization can be measured through the implementation of a number of specific tools. This could be measured with the help of a survey questionnaire, where the responses of the employees about the organizational methods and procedures are collected for analysis of gaps or loopholes. In this respect, providing the healthcare professionals with performance feedbacks can help in personal and professional development.

Additionally, the employees need to be made a part of the organizational decision-making process. As asserted by Melnyk, Gallagher?Ford, Long & Fineout?Overholt (2014), positive culture of communication can help in meeting with the organizational attributes as well as settlement of internal disputes. Some of the measurement tools such as S.C.O.R.E can be used to measure and enhance employee satisfaction.  Here, SCORE stands for Simple-Connect-Observe – React-Engage and is customer service training designed to equip staffs with key concepts of service excellence.  The employment of such methods helps in the development of positive attitude within the hospital staffs such as connect, which helps them in communicating with the patient and their respective families.

Necessary Processes

For the purpose of employee engagement, leaders need to clearly communicate the organizational goals and financial information to the employees.  In this case, if the employees fail to understand the effect of their actions upon the finances of the nursing home they will not be actively engaged in reaching their goals. As commented by Andreasson, Eriksson & Dellve (2016), the opinions provided by the employees during the process of meeting need to be taken into consideration by the management. Therefore, providing the employees with sufficient space to raise questions regarding the organizational processes can enhance the engagement policies.

(Source: Author)

Some of the leadership practices which can be employed within the current organization for improving the organizational culture are- taking accountability for the mistakes performed by leaders, communicating effectively to the employees about the goals and the objectives, self-reflection over the leadership roles.

Here, the leader is supposed to take accountability for a wrong work performed by one of his employees. This is because the leader is the responsible person to review and pass the piece of work presented by his due employees. As mentioned by Silva, Eslick & Duque (2013), the display of accountability on the part of the leader cause the employees to develop a sense of gratitude and responsibility. In addition, practicing effective communication approaches can help the leader in reaching out to the employees and help in the settlement of the organizational disputes. The attribute of self-reflection also needs to be given importance for sufficient personal and professional development within the leader

References:

Al-Balushi, S., Sohal, A. S., Singh, P. J., Al Hajri, A., Al Farsi, Y. M., & Al Abri, R. (2014). Readiness factors for lean implementation in healthcare settings–a literature review. Journal of health organization and management, 28(2), 135-153.

Andreasson, J., Eriksson, A., & Dellve, L. (2016). Health care managers' views on and approaches to implementing models for improving care processes. Journal of nursing management, 24(2), 219-227.

Bagshaw, S. M., Stelfox, H. T., McDermid, R. C., Rolfson, D. B., Tsuyuki, R. T., Baig, N., ... & Majumdar, S. R. (2014). Association between frailty and short-and long-term outcomes among critically ill patients: a multicentre prospective cohort study. Canadian Medical Association Journal, 186(2), E95-E102.

Collini, S. A., Guidroz, A. M., & Perez, L. M. (2015). Turnover in health care: the mediating effects of employee engagement. Journal of nursing management, 23(2), 169-178.

Crawford, E. R., Rich, B. L., Buckman, B., & Bergeron, J. (2014). The antecedents and drivers of employee engagement. Employee engagement in theory and practice, 57-81.

Fiabane, E., Giorgi, I., Sguazzin, C., & Argentero, P. (2013). Work engagement and occupational stress in nurses and other healthcare workers: the role of organisational and personal factors. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 22(17-18), 2614-2624.

Kuys, S. S., Peel, N. M., Klein, K., Slater, A., & Hubbard, R. E. (2014). Gait speed in ambulant older people in long term care: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Journal of the American Medical Directors Association, 15(3), 194-200.

Melnyk, B. M., Gallagher?Ford, L., Long, L. E., & Fineout?Overholt, E. (2014). The establishment of evidence?based practice competencies for practicing registered nurses and advanced practice nurses in real?world clinical settings: proficiencies to improve healthcare quality, reliability, patient outcomes, and costs. Worldviews on Evidence?Based Nursing, 11(1), 5-15.

Silva, R. B., Eslick, G. D., & Duque, G. (2013). Exercise for falls and fracture prevention in long term care facilities: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Journal of the American Medical Directors Association, 14(9), 685-689.

Verleye, K., Gemmel, P., & Rangarajan, D. (2014). Managing engagement behaviors in a network of customers and stakeholders: Evidence from the nursing home sector. Journal of Service Research, 17(1), 68-84.

White, M., Wells, J. S., & Butterworth, T. (2014). The impact of a large-scale quality improvement programme on work engagement: Preliminary results from a national cross-sectional-survey of the ‘Productive Ward’. International journal of nursing studies, 51(12), 1634-1643.