Andrew Lindsay

Rest home/Nursing home Trends

Health 100

As I have taken Health 100 and learned more about public health and the many career paths in it I have become very excited about the idea of hospital administration. Particularly working in Nursing homes, this helped me decided to do me decided to do my research on Nursing homes to find out what challenges the Elderly are facing and what contributes to that. To do this I talked to two individuals who work in nursing homes. The first is Cory Borup he is the owner of the Alpine Home Care Nursing home in Orem Ut. and the other is Bryan Lindsay who is the Executive Director of The Life care center of Coeur d’Alene.             

One of the Challenges of Hospital Administration is Regulatory Compliance. Bryan said that Regulatory Compliance is when they have to keep up with the all the city and states regulations. Making sure their staff is properly trained that and that the patients are receiving the correct treatments and medications. This is tedious but vital for the patients and staffs wellbeing. When these things are not done correctly it has a bad effect on the patients and can cause financial and legal problems to the company.  –Corey Borup

                Another Trend facing the Hospital Administration Field is a changing demographic. In the past more patients in rest/nursing homes would be there for the long term. Now the trend is that more people that would live in the nursing homes long term are applying for Assisted Living. This is when the government helps provide for some of their financial help while they are living at home being taken care of by a family member. This is taking a toll on Nursing homes who are now looking for more people to fill the spaces. While it may be convenient to live at home, living at home can make it difficult to get all the required care need and those taking care may not be qualified to be taking care of them. –Bryan Lindsay                                  

              In Hospital Administration there are a lot of Reimbursement Issues. This means that they deal a lot with Medicare, Medicaid and Private insurances. This is a important to public health because many of the people they work with have a difficult time paying for the bills. It is especially difficult for the elderly and so sometimes the patients can only get the minimal amount covered providing them with only the minimal amount they need. This is one of the most difficult things to work with said Bryan because you really care about the people you are serving and you want to see them get well and be happy but at the same time you need to help the company to do well. It’s a difficult thing to balance.                                              

             A trend that affects the health of the patients in the rest homes is infection control. Because most of the people in the rest homes are elderly their bodies and immune systems do not work as well as what would be hoped for. So when there is a community epidemic of the flu for example they have to protect the patients which means sometimes they cannot allow new patients because it put everyone else in danger. To help them do this they have to rely on epidemiology, to help track the diseases and the prevalence. These epidemics also require them to use MRSA which is a national multi-drug program which is intended to protect the elderly. –Bryan Lindsay

            Many of the patients are also affected because of loneliness and depression. Now many of them are not there for the long term but there are some that basically live there because the diseases they are suffering from cause them to always need attention a treatment. Many of them have hard financial circumstances; they don’t have friends or family visiting them. The reason this effect the patients’ health is because without happiness or the desire to recover it can make it more difficult to recover. Physical health isn’t the only health, these things can be damaging to their mental health as well. –Corey Borup