News

Lifesprk been named a Top USA Workplace and #1 in healthcare for mid-size companies in the Top Workplaces Industry and Culture Excellence Awards.

Ecumen, a nonprofit provider of housing and services for older adults, has announced that Jim McAlpine has joined its senior management team as senior vice president, legal affairs and corporate general counsel.

This month, Friendship Village of Bloomington will officially open the first phase of its new health center to area seniors. The project adds 16 assisted living apartment homes and five memory care suites to the senior living community, bringing the total communitywide capacity to 42 assisted living apartments and 32 memory care suites. The three-story building is equipped with a secure memory care courtyard, game and activity room, and spa bath.

Gov. Tim Walz and Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) Commissioner Jan Malcolm visited Jones-Harrison to highlight Minnesota’s successful vaccination effort in long-term care settings on the afternoon of Tuesday, Feb. 9.

LeadingAge Minnesota extends our deep appreciation and gratitude to Sue Voigt, partner at Voigt, Rode, Boxeth & Coffin Law Firm, for her years of dedicated service to our field and our association. Sue has announced she has stepped away from her practice as of Feb. 1, 2021.

Just last week, Matt Steele joined the LeadingAge Minnesota advocacy team. We want you to get to know Matt so we asked him five questions:

As we turn the page on a new year, we invite you to get involved in LeadingAge Minnesota committees in 2021. Ongoing COVID-19 response and recovery, implementation of new Assisted Living Licensure requirements, protection of Value Based Reimbursement for care centers—just a few of the impactful issues facing senior care in the coming year. Through it all we have a tremendous opportunity to improve the aging experience for those we serve, and we encourage everyone’s involvement in our committees to shape the important work ahead.

The Metro Healthcare Coalition is offering a mini-webinar on management and tracking of PPE on Monday, December 28, at 1:00pm. Mary Ryan and Aaron Aslakson from Walker Methodist will share tools created and used at their organization to track and manage PPE supplies. The webinar will be approximately 30 minutes and will include time for Q&A. If you’d like to attend this webinar, register HERE.

Start 2021 off with new staff joining your team!

Skilled nursing facilities have the ability to train caregivers quickly using the Basic Care Aide and Paid Feeding Assistant programs from EduCare. The expedited training programs are eligible under the current 1135 waiver, allowing you to train Basic Care Aides in just 9 hours and paid feeding assistants within 2 hours. Basic Care Aides are eligible to work in place of traditional nursing assistants.

Your staff has been working extremely hard this year in unprecedented conditions. Want to do something special for them? We have just the thing – our annual Stars Among Us Awards honor and celebrate caregivers, leaders and rising stars in our settings throughout Minnesota.

This year’s “100 Most Influential Health Care Leaders” list published by Minnesota Physician, a medical business journal, includes three prominent leaders at LeadingAge Minnesota: Jerry Carley, President and CEO; Benedictine; Dr. Rahul Koranne, President and CEO, Minnesota Hospital Association; and Gayle Kvenvold, President and CEO, LeadingAge Minnesota

We are excited to announce that Luke Jenkins has joined our team as the Director of Membership. Luke comes to LeadingAge Minnesota with almost 10 years of experience in the senior care field, most recently serving as Director of Community Relations and then Corporate Marketing & Sales Consultant with Ebenezer.

Vista Prairie Communities (VPC), a nonprofit provider of assisted living, independent living, memory care and care suites in Minnesota, Iowa and Ohio, has announced the appointment of

Strategies for Diffusing Challenging Situations, a webinar on Aug. 14, will explore practical strategies designed to help staff diffuse the highly and emotionally charged situations so that difficult conversations about what can be done occur and enable the parties to move forward together.  

As we develop new tools and resources to help you combat COVID-19 and comply with changing state and federal guidance, we remind you to visit our COVID-19 web page where you will find a wide variety of resources. 

The LeadingAge Minnesota Foundation (LAMF) last week awarded $660,000 in COVID-19 grants to fund staff support and virtual adult day services. 

In this week’s Resource Round-Up, we feature three new resources released last week: Essential Caregivers, Visitation Guidance Decision-Making Grid, and Adult Day Re-Opening 

In this week’s COVID-19 Resource Round-Up, we feature new tools and resources to help you understand, design and implement the new Essential Caregiver designation in your community. 

As we continue to push for a clear, cogent testing strategy and reimbursement process from the State of Minnesota, we know you are faced with many decisions when it comes testing residents and staff. Our new COVID-19 “Whole House” Testing Decision Guide is a workflow process designed to help you consider what approach is best for your setting. It includes links to key resources to guide your decision and implement your plan. Resources include:

In this week’s COVID-19 Resource Round-Up, we feature new tools that will help nursing homes enhance infection control, guide providers in testing, and ideas and guidance on how to engage residents during a time of social distancing and visitor restrictions.