Overview
Achterberg et al ., (2010), the revolution witnessed in the long term care and the mental care has taken a little time. The system has its roots on the federal demonstrations efforts such as National Long-Term Care Demonstrations. Due to the uniqueness of the services offered in this sector, the long term and the mental care has faced both challenges and also opportunities as compared to other sectors in the healthcare institutions. Two major factors bring this challenge; one is the uniqueness of the services and the second one is the ever-existing challenges healthcare sector face in different countries in the world. This paper will adress some of the challenges as well as opportunities which the long term and mental health care managements face on a daily basis.
Challenges
Employee Shortages
The first and a major challenge these services face are the staff inadequacy. The demand for the services for the long-term and mental health care is more than the staff availability. The trend of the nurse and other care professional shortages in the mental and long term care services sector is increasingly becoming familiar in all part of the world. As asserted by Health Care Challenges Facing Administrators Today (2012), the statistics have it that almost 95 percent of the long term care and mental care institution are facing healthcare workers shortages crisis in the world. The trend of vacancies for the nurse who is capable of providing mental care and care for the old is showing an increasing trend, and the statistic released by the Center for Disease Control in the years 2014 estimated the vacancies to increase to thirty-two percent. On the part of the management of the mental care in hospitals, this issue has have given health care managers a headache on workforce management as well as shortages in their care institutions.
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High turnover of long-term and mental Healthcare workforce
One major problem for the healthcare managers in the home care and mental health care institution is the less recruits which are majorly contributed by the high turnover in these institutions. This issue has continued to result in inconsistency of and inadequate recruits of the staff in this institution, an issue which has impacted negatively on the care administrators and the issue of acquiring enough workforces to work on these institutions. Currently, the statistics documents that the prevailing turnover rate stands at twenty-one percent for the nurse national wide. This is much lower as compared to the normal turnover which supposes the limits in other healthcare areas. Many factors are accused to be contributing to this menace. However, immigration, alternative for other jobs availability and the retrial sectors are the leading factors which greatly interfere with this matter as they provide alternatives for those aspiring to be nurse.
Difficulties in improving Quality of Services
In comparison, it takes more challenging action and task to improve the quality of the mental and; long term care than the acute care in the country. As opposed to acute care where action tuned at clarify medical care errors and achieving specific care outcome are enough to improve, mental care and long term care is often difficult to improve since its outcome and goals are often difficult to measure or determine. The healthcare administrators in this area must overturn the obstacles which are often complex and persistent in this institution. Another challenge to improving services in these institutions is the number of the mental stakeholders as well as medical, psychological terrains involved in these facilities. This makes it more difficult for long term decision and plans to be made in the facilities due to the system of the bureaucracy which prevails in these systems in the world.
Opportunities
The United States of America suffered an economic recession in some centuries ago; however, the country is healing from this economic wound. This has a positive implication to the long term and mental care in the country (Long term healthcare confronting today challenges, 2014). First, the job space in the market is getting slender thus more people may resort to utilize such vacancies that are overwhelming in the mental care and long term care institutions. Secondly, the economic rejuvenation of the country means that the health sector will entirely benefit from the fund's allocations. This will improve employments, services and management thus, will have a positive impact on this matter.
Skills and knowledge
An ideal healthcare administrators require some skills to be able to take these challenges and take advantage of the, mentioned opportunities. The skills are inclusive of the evidenced based decision making to avoiding pouncing on unjustified matters. The second skill is the balance created between the patient, organization and personal benefits. Alternatively, they need interpersonal relation skills to be able to manage well these institutions; lastly, they need leadership skills to provide correct direction for the organization and its components.
The knowledge need by these staff are inclusive of the operation management knowledge for them to be able to deliver quality daily operations, they need competencies and knowledge on their roles and responsibilities and those of their staff. Lastly, the organization administrators and nurse should have healthcare laws and ethics at their fingertips; this is one area where one can easily be sued for either autonomy or patient confidentiality.
References
Achterberg, W. P., Gambassi, G., Finne-Soveri, H., Liperoti, R., Noro, A., Frijters, D. H., ... & Ribbe, M. W. (2010). Pain in European long-term care facilities: cross-national study in Finland, Italy and The Netherlands. Pain , 148 (1), 70-74.
Health Care Challenges Facing Administrators Today. (2012). Saint Joseph's University Online . Retrieved September 13, 2014, from http://online.sju.edu/resource/health-human-services/health-care-challenges-facing-administrators-today
Long term healthcare confronting todays challenges. (n.d.). Academy Health . Retrieved September 14, 2014, from http://www.academyhealth.org/files/publicati ons/ltcchallenges.pdf
