We live in a world with an aging population and many people with specific needs that need caring for. When you consider this, you can understand why care homes are a big business. It takes support workers and other staff to ensure a care setting runs at the level it needs to. Luckily we can help with recruitment. Continue reading →

Increased awareness of medical errors and rising healthcare costs have drawn attention to improving the quality of care patients receive in healthcare facilities. To ensure improvements in healthcare quality, various care redesign initiatives are being taken and evaluated as well as efforts are being made to improve care coordination, safety, patient outcomes, cost-cutting, and efficiency.

Primary care providers are more connected to patients and are in a better position to understand an individual patient’s journey and needs. Hence, they’re best positioned to impact the quality of patient care. When it comes to patient-centred care, primary care providers can act as a hub.

If you’re not sure how to improve patient care, this guide offers some effective tips:

Prioritize Improving Patient Experience

Research shows that negative patient experience is among the top reasons why patients switch providers. Studies also suggest that patients receiving high-quality care remain more committed and engaged with the treatment plans and are more receptive to healthcare advice.

Therefore, start prioritizing patient experience in your healthcare facility. This should help improve all aspects of patient care, such as communication, documentation, supplying records, shaping attitudes, and more.

Consider Using Language Your Patients Understand

Effective communication has always been a critical component of healthcare service. To build patient trust and increase satisfaction, you need to enhance the communication skills of the medical staff.

Clearly communicating the course of action and health information often translates into better health outcomes, especially in connection with certain chronic diseases, including greater control over diabetes, better medication compliance for high blood pressure, and a decrease in mortality associated with heart diseases.

When it comes to communication, though, few healthcare providers talk to their patients using terminology they can easily understand. The medical field is full of jargon that’s hardly understood by ordinary people. Besides this, not being able to set aside your own personal reactions and your own perception of the world are some other factors that may hinder effective communication.

Healthcare providers need to do their best to eliminate these obstacles and ensure their messages are clearly understood by patients. While clear communication helps improve patient care, ineffective communication often results in increased readmission rates and poor follow through leads to worsening of disease. If communication involves negativities such as degrading or humiliating patients, a healthcare facility can even face malpractice claims.

Work with Patients’ Advocates

To engage patients and keep them committed to treatment plans, healthcare providers must also understand what’s there in patients’ minds. In many cases, however, it’s not easy to make out patient’s views and opinions, preventing the healthcare providers from delivering patient-centred care.  That’s where a patient advocate can help.

A patient advocate can be the patient’s family member or friend, or even a hired independent professional that serves as a bridge between the healthcare provider and the patient. Not only do they help you obtain a better understanding of what the patient feels, but they also assist the patient in understanding the treatment process and various options they have.

Make the Most of Healthcare Data

According to the modern data-driven world, you can’t manage things without analysing them. A sophisticated and highly efficient way to improve the quality of patient care is to analyse the existing healthcare data to identify areas of opportunities and improvements. Advanced IT-based systems have made a wealth of data available that drive more connected and patient-centric care.

Healthcare data includes both patient data and information regarding organisational operations. Healthcare providers can use the insights obtained from data analysis to set minimum benchmarks for patient care and outcomes, which can then serve as metrics for evaluation.

While Electronic Health Records (EHRs) were primarily introduced to foster patient-centred care, it mostly focuses on documentation, efficient billing, and more revenue generation.

If you really want to improve patient care, you’ll need to start tracking patient experiences, including negative ones, just as you track your billing. Closely monitor overall well-being of patients, patient outcomes, and costs for individual patients throughout their healthcare journeys.

You can do that through EHRs, conducting patient satisfaction surveys, outcome studies, and other information sources to collect data. If you’re a large healthcare facility collecting massive amounts of data, you may even consider using Big Data solutions such as Apache Hadoop, which helps organise large volumes of structured and unstructured data and make insightful interpretations from it.

Collaborate with Specialised Organisations

Once you’ve identified operational errors and areas of improvement in patient care, your focus should shift on how to improve the quality of care. One tremendous strategy is to connect with companies or agencies that specialise in providing patient-centred care services. Backed by in-depth research, these organisations can suggest ways to eliminate shortcomings and solutions to problems.

Choosing an organisation is not simple, though. You’ll need to extensively research online, read literature, and attend conferences to track the best care agencies. Once you’ve identified certain companies, connect with them and take the opportunity to learn from them. The best care companies will be happy to share experiences like how they’ve helped healthcare providers make a positive difference in the lives of certain patients.

Once you find the right care agency, partner up with them to enhance patient care and patient outcomes.

Let’s take an example to clarify this. Suppose you find out that your healthcare facility lacks staff with a patient-centric mindset, which is impacting the quality of healthcare. A specialised care agency such as Careline Solutions can help you recruit the right care staff, including nurses, ancillary staff, managers, etc.

Final Thoughts

Now that you’ve obtained valuable insights into how to improve patient care, it’s time to execute these strategies. Besides the points mentioned above, you also need to consider your staff, as their attitude has a huge impact on the patient and their experience.

For recruitment of experienced staff, contact Careline Solutions today.

At Careline Solutions our aim is to offer the most reliable services for each of our clients. Our focus is offering recruitment solutions for care homes that meet any need. Whether it is a short term vacancy or a long term appointment, when you work with us we find the right person for the job. All our staff have great training and full qualifications, so rely on us. Continue reading →

Careline Solutions excels in the recruitment of care assistants. We make sure that everyone is ready for the job before sending them to you. This includes putting them through training and updating their skills regularly. Depending on your needs, they can be with you on a temporary or permanent basis. Continue reading →

The care sector includes various settings and it takes a lot of people to ensure individuals receive the level of support that they require. We can help provide you with professionals such as nurses and registered managers. This will leave you not having to worry about filling vacancies, even if it is only temporary. Continue reading →

Care staff play an important role, but sometimes there is a shortage of workers. This may be due to a lack of available hands or an increase in need. While the festive season brings joy, it can also bring about these situations and issues. Careful planning for the recruitment of care staff for this period is essential. You will then be able to avoid issues and make sure that you take the right approach. Continue reading →

As more people turn old, the need for carers increases. According to research, a shortage of carers is one of the top three reasons why care agencies are in high demand. There are various people to take care of – but not as many carers since the hiring process is long and difficult. If you are wondering how to find the right care staff, then you have come to the right place.  Here are some tips that will help you attract the right candidates for care assistant jobs.

Advertise

The first step is to advertise that you are looking for carers – it will make it easier to attract the right kind of people for the job. Make sure to clearly state what you expect from the employee in a separate section. You should also mention the values of your care home and what you aim to achieve with your work.

Don’t forget to use the right tone and language that represents your care home and what you stand for. Lastly, not everyone can be a carer since you need a certain level of empathy and patience to do this job. Keep in mind to add the reality of what this job entails so that only serious and committed candidates apply.

You can advertise in many different ways. You can advertise in newspapers, use job boards or post on social media pages.

Screen Your Potential Employees

Once you advertise that you are looking for responsible staff, you will have many applicants. To narrow down the applicants, you will have to screen potential employees. You can do this by carrying out extensive background checks and administrating personality tests. Both of these will help you learn about potential employees and their behaviour. These may take some time, but it will help you learn more about the people who you might end up hiring and working with.

A carer’s job is extremely crucial and can’t be taken lightly. Hence, it is essential to screen the candidates thoroughly so that the client’s health and lives are not at risk.

Interview Them

After zeroing in on potential employees, your next step will be to interview them for care assistant jobs. Make sure to start off with standard interview questions. For instance, ask them why they want to do this job and how they think their strengths will apply to their work.

Deciding what questions to ask during care assistant interviews is extremely difficult. It is always better to be prepared beforehand. This will make you seem professional and will save plenty of time. Here are a few types of questions you can focus on during the recruitment interviews.

Direct Questions

As the name states, these questions are straight to the point, which makes it easier to let the candidate know what they are signing up for. For example, a direct question would be, ‘How much experience do you have dealing with seniors?’ This will help you learn more about your candidate and make it easier to filter out what you want in an employee and what you do not. It will also give you insight into your candidate’s skill set and make it easier to shortlist candidates.

Behavioral Questions

Behavioral questions will mostly focus on your potential candidate’s behavior with the care home and the seniors. Tell them that you will most likely contact their previous employer to learn more about their work ethic and behavior. A good way to learn about their behavior on the job is to ask them for examples from their previous workplace. For example, ask them how they behave around seniors and how they provided excellent service to a client. This way, you will learn more about the employee’s personality and how they will blend in with the people around them.

Hypothetical Questions

Another way to question the potential candidates is by putting them in certain situations and asking them how they will react. Dealing with seniors is not always easy – you need patience and have to be gentle at all times. Someone who has a short temper might not be the most suitable candidate for this job since they may lash out at clients.

Put your potential employees in hypothetical situations. To see if they are good under pressure, ask them how they would react if a client shouted at them. You can also ask them how they would react if the client asked them the same question again and again. Many senior clients suffer from dementia; hence, the staff that you hire must be patient and passionate. Don’t hide this fact from them – let them know that the job can be stressful at times, so they are aware of what they are signing up for.

Skill Questions

These are similar to direct questions, but they focus mostly on what skills and qualities a potential candidate possesses. Before hiring a carer, it is essential to ask them if they have enough medical knowledge to handle the situation if things get out of control. Your candidate must know how to help someone through a seizure or a panic attack. It is best to go with candidates who know exactly what to do if their client has a stroke or a heart attack since they need to act immediately.

Once you have interviewed all the candidates for care assistant jobs, evaluate their answers without any bias and make your decision.

Monitor Your Employees

After you have gone through the hiring process, it is vital to monitor your employees to see if they are doing a satisfying job. You can do this by asking your clients for feedback and if you get any, ask your employees to commit to it.

Finding the right care staff may seem difficult, but once you find the right people, it will be worth it. To learn more about care assistant jobs and care agencies in Slough, visit our website by clicking here.