Please respond to the discussion question
Discussion Question:
Being a long-term care administrator carries a lot of responsibility. Based on your course readings, identify three areas of responsibility that require additional training. What strategies would you implement to become an effective administrator? Discuss the impact of job burnout for long-term care administrators.
This is what I wrote:
Areas of responsibility that require additional training;
Variety in the range of services
Active participation in value initiatives such as quality first and advancing excellence
Development of resident-centered.
Strategies to implement to become an effective administrator
Flexibility; always be willing to make changes where needed so that it matches the needs of the patients and helps in improving their welfare.
Passion; an effective administrator should love their work. When one has a passion for what they are doing, they tend to give it their best and therefore producing excellent results. Passion helps an administrator cope with the patients who are mostly elderly and need to be handled with a lot of care and patience.
Perseverance; the patients might, at times, be nagging and refuse to co-operate. Therefore, the caregiver has to practice the utmost patience to enable him/her to handle the patient well.
Impact of job burnout for long-term care administrators
Skepticism; is where the administrator detaches themselves from a victim they are supposed to be assisting. According to Angerer (2003), skepticism is a response to job strain where workers start to withdraw and dissociate themselves from work and colleagues as an attempt to safeguard themselves from fatigue (Yee-Melichar, Flores & Cabigoa, 2014).
Emotional weariness; weariness is the state of being extremely tired both physically and mentally and is a reaction to job strain. According to Maslach et al. (2001), fatigue makes individuals dissociate themselves perceptually and emotionally from their tasks and overburdened work and inadequate resources. According to studies carried out by Cho, Laschinger, and Wong(2006), it was discovered that 66% of the recently graduated caregivers were categorized as severely burned out.
Executive effectiveness; Maslach et al. (2001) posits that inefficacy come up when a worker feels that they dont have the necessary skills needed to do their job which has a direct connection to inadequate resources .ineffectiveness in work makes individuals insufficient and see their achievements as insignificant (Angerer,2003)
References
Angerer, J. M. (2003). Job burnout. Journal of Employment Counseling, 40(3), 98107
Cho, J., Laschinger, H. K. S., & Wong, C. (2006). Workplace empowerment, work engagement, and organizational commitment of new graduate nurses. Canadian Journal of Nursing Leadership, 19(3), 4360.
Maslach, C., Schaufeli, W. B., & Leiter, M. P. (2001). Job burnout. Annual Review of Psychology, 52 (1), 397422
Yee-Melichar, D., Flores, C. M. & Cabigoa, E. P. (2014). Long-term care administration and management. New York, NY: Springer Publishing Company. Hard copy: ISBN-13: 978-0-8261-9567-8 Ebook ISBN: 978-0-8261-9571
Respond to these 2 questions:
1. Responsibilities of A Long-Term Care Administrator
Long-term care administrators play the role of overseeing everyday operations of the assisted living facility, adult daycare, or nursing home. In this capacity, the key responsibilities entail financial management, marketing, staffing, community outreach, and supervising resident care. This job requires a thorough understanding of the local, state, and federal standards for long-term care is vital (Barken & Armstrong, 2018). Thus, numerous facilities go for an individual with a minimum degree holder in some long-term care experience and a related field. On a typical working day, an LTC administrator engages in creating a working schedule, managing patient fees, communicating with the staff. Also overseeing the admissions process, directing fun activities for live-in patients, purchasing medical equipment, training new employees, and keeping service records. The LTC administrators will usually attend meetings with local governing boards, families, therapists, and physicians.
Areas of Responsibility Requiring More Training
To guarantee success in an LTC facility, an administrator needs to fine-tune the interpersonal skills to effective communication with employees, speaking with health insurance representatives and collaborating with the executive directors. The LTC facility directors must be knowledgeable about the latest laws in health care and acquiring analytical skills to make the required policy transformations (Barken & Armstrong, 2018). Being detailed-oriented is beneficial for LTC administrators, which will help ensure that the record-keeping procedure is organized and streamlined as possible. Problem-solving, managerial, ethical decision-making skills, and critical thinking are very vital. The LTC managers ought to have a specific level of technical capacity for utilizing electronic health latest technologies.
Strategies to Implement in Becoming an Active Administrator
Be flexible – An administrator must be willing to make transformations.
On some occasions, a manager must change the operations of their skilled nursing care facility. This entails setting off a mission of doing things differently by placing all the focus on improving the residents well-being. This will enable a facility to attain more than 140 criteria put forth by the federal administration for the Medicaid Services and Centers of Medicare centers.
Identifying what works facility’s scores go a long way in determining the success of an administrator. Some of the things that are likely to increase the success and efficiency of center improved customer service, communication, and employee development (Yee-Melichar et al., 2014). An administrator should ensure that staff make sure families and patients are happy with the type the care the facility provides and communicating expectations. Also, it is essential to involve the families in decision making and comprehending their loved ones and comprehend their loved ones medical care. Setting true expectations and following through help ensure that an administrator accomplishes what facility promises families and residents.
Persevere the constantly transforming world of health is sufficient in making an administrator throw in the towel. But this is the point one should keep going forward. Therefore, an administrator should never show any signs of slowing down. It requires unique dedication for ones life in the LTC and involvement in the organization’s operation. An active administrator must always be punctual and ensuring all the operations within a nursing home are on time.
Impact of Job Burnout for Long-Term Care Administrators
According to Stens and Zalaquett (2006), the older adult population in the United States is growing older. Such a population consisting of the older is likely to attain 20% of the overall population by 2030. The increase of the older adult population will greatly cause an impact in the LTC facilities. The nursing homes will be forced to address matters such as staffing and dwindling of the financial resources (Zalaquett & Stens, 2006). The increasing responsibilities are likely to continue adding the degree of stress to NHA (nursing home administrators) who is a pillar in the LTC. Dissatisfied and stressed at the workplace and with their roles, they are likely to quit the industry and demonstrate job burnout symptoms. According to Hughes, Castle, and Ferguson, (2009), donates that NHA is accountable for initiating quality assurance projects and oversight of the care practices. An LTC administrator is likely to become dissatisfied with their occupations secondary as a result of a high workload. A continuous increase in working load with no additional staff to assist with the workload leads to administrator disengagement.
The NHA should manifest high professional efficacy, low cynicism, and moderate degrees emotional. Fundamentally, while an administrator experiences emotional depletion, they are supposed to maintain great levels of efficiency and should not display cynicism. Satcher and Templeton (2007) carried research on job burnout amid rehabilitation counselors and established that the counselors demonstrated high personal attainment, low depersonalization, and moderate emotional exhaustion. Whenever answering why an individual would voluntarily choose to remain in a professional when the workload is fundamental in predicting job burnout. One has to look are the intangible advantages of the profession (Templeton & Satcher, 2007). While the profession continues to prepare and grow for the next generation of older residents, the LTC must work towards establishing a culture in the workplace that permits the administrators to balance all the duties.
Reference
Barken, R., & Armstrong, P. (2018). Skills of workers in long-term residential care: exploring complexities, challenges, and opportunities. Ageing International, 43(1), 110122. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12126-017-9285-7
Castle, N. G., Ferguson, J. C., & Hughes, K. (2009). Humanism in nursing homes: The impact of top management. Journal of Health & Human Services Administration, 31(4), 483516.
Smith, D. (2019). Job Description of a Long-Term Care Administrator. Retrieved from:
https://work.chron.com/job-description-longterm-care-administrator-16264.html
Templeton, M. C., & Satcher, J. (2007). Job burnout among public rehabilitation counselors. Journal of Applied Rehabilitation Counseling, 38(1), 3945.
Yee-Melichar, D., Flores, C. M. & Cabigoa, E. P. (2014). Long-term care administration and management. NY: Springer Publishing Company
Zalaquett, C. P., & Stens, A. N. (2006). Psychosocial treatments for major depression and dysthymia in older adults: A review of the research literature. Journal of Counseling & Development, 84(2), 192204.
2. Long-Term Care Administrator
Similar to other health administrators, long-term care administrators have numerous responsibilities in their oversight of the daily operations of the care facilities. They have an important role which entails utilizing their administrative expertise to enhance the quality of care services offered to patients. In light of their responsibilities, some of the responsibility areas that require extra training include interpersonal skills to ensure effective communications with the necessary stakeholders; analytic skills to enhance their capacity to contribute to policy changes; and, the need to improve the level of technical ability to ensure they can utilize the emerging electronic health technologies (Castle, Furnier, Ferguson-Rome, Olson, & Johs-Artisensi, 2015). These would improve their capacity to carry out their responsibilities effectively.
To become an effective administrator, the key strategy entails several steps that would effectively influence the relationship with other stakeholders. The strategy entails listening to feedback, both positive and negative, and making the necessary changes. It equally entails being passionate about what an individual does. This makes it easy to go through random bad days. It is important to be well organized to avoid pressure associated with doing things last minute. It is equally important to be clear with the employees. This entails speaking up when an employee is making a mistake. Ultimately, commitment to quality is very important. The administrator must be committed to operational and clinical benchmarking, accountability, and staff education (The Long Term Care Professional Leadership Council, n.d.). Collectively, these steps make up a strategy that makes an effective administrator.
Job burnout is detrimental to long-term care administrators. First, it leads to emotional exhaustion. This has a negative impact since it leads to personnel distancing themselves mentally and emotionally from their work due to excessive workload to too many demands and scarce resources. Secondly, job burnout leads to cynicism. This manifests when care providers distance themselves from people they are expected to care for. It is characterized by a negative attitude towards patients. Thirdly, job burnout is known to reduce efficiency in service delivery (Wilson, 2018).
References
Castle, N. G., Furnier, J., Ferguson-Rome, J. C., Olson, D., & Johs-Artisensi, J. (2015). Quality of care and long-term care administrators education. Health Care Management Review, 40(1), 35-45. doi:10.1097/hmr.0000000000000007
The Long Term Care Professional Leadership Council. (n.d.). ESSENTIAL CORE FUNCTIONS: Responsibilities, Knowledge, and Skills. Retrieved from The Long Term Care Professional Leadership Council website: https://achca.memberclicks.net/assets/docs/ltcplc_core_func-r_6-07lw.pdf
Wilson, F. L. (2018). What is the impact of job burnout on nursing home administrators? Journal of Diversity Management (JDM), 13(1), 1-6. doi:10.19030/jdm.v13i1.10201
