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Care centers have access to an engagement, retention, and leadership building platform for free through a grant for Align’s Employee Engagement Solution. A new grant window opened on Sept. 22 and closes on Nov. 23. Subsequent cycles will open over the next two years.

The greatest act of kindness that you can practice without any cost and minimal effort is being kind to yourself. Don’t beat yourself up for things not in your control. Use kind words when you talk to yourself – do what you can, do not dwell on what you cannot. Practice kindness on yourself and being kind to others will come naturally (Ghate, 2021).

The National Association of Health Care Assistants (NAHCA) is hosting a workshop titled, The New CNA Workforce: Frontline Lessons from the Pandemic on Nov. 10 from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Register here today!

Nearly 70% of nursing homes are pausing admissions due to staff shortage

ST. PAUL, MN (Oct. 7, 2021) – Reaffirming that Minnesota’s workforce shortage in senior care continues to grow, a recent survey of more than 300 Minnesota senior care providers conducted by the Long-Term Care Imperative revealed that 69% of Minnesota nursing homes and 29% of assisted living locations have placed limits on new resident admissions because of an inability to fill staff positions.  

With over 23,000 direct care positions currently vacant across the state, the expanding worker shortage is challenging the ability of senior caregivers to provide care to Minnesota’s rapidly growing senior population and support hospitals that are seeking to discharge patients into care facilities. According to the survey, in August the number of resignations of long-term care professionals exceeded new hires by approximately 2,000 workers.

 “The data on open positions and staff retention confirms that a growing number of elderly Minnesotans will not receive the care they need in our settings, and families will be limited in their choices when they most need our services.  State leaders need to step forward with both emergency action and long-term solutions to help attract and retain workers in the profession of senior care,” said Patti Cullen, CEO of Care Providers of Minnesota.

Shortages exist across the spectrum of long-term care positions, including Certified Nursing Assistants, Registered Nurses, laundry and nutrition services. Nursing homes in every region of the state reported double-digit percentages of unfilled positions for direct care workers, which account for over half of reported vacancies. At nursing homes in the Twin Cities metro, roughly 1 in 4 direct care and nurse practitioner positions stand empty. In just the month of August, an estimated 7,975 senior care workers resigned from their jobs in long-term care to seek work in other fields.

Gayle Kvenvold, CEO of LeadingAge Minnesota explained, “Our caregivers deserve the pay that reflects the importance of their work and helps providers deliver safe, quality care to all who need their critical services. Even with the widespread use of overtime pay and bonuses, more caregivers are leaving our field than joining it. We need a commitment from the state to invest in higher wages to guarantee seniors receive the care they need when they need it in all the communities they call home.”

The Long-Term Care Imperative is calling on state policymakers to address the crisis with immediate emergency staffing as well as long-term reforms to ensure competitive wages for caregivers. The highly regulated nature of senior care makes it immensely difficult to address these issues without financial support and regulatory relief from state government. State regulators set the daily rate charged by nursing homes for both privately paying residents and those receiving state support. In addition, senior care providers must wait 21 months after providing care to receive reimbursement from the State. The increased costs to attract new workers, intense competition for jobs, delayed reimbursement and modest growth in Medical Assistance funding combine to make it difficult for providers to adapt to the changes in the labor market for senior caregivers.

Kvenvold said, “This workforce problem won’t be solved with a one-time infusion of dollars into senior care reimbursement. Without more significant investments in the senior care workforce and changes to the reimbursement system to allow this to happen, this crisis will threaten the availability of care for the most vulnerable at a time when we are facing the largest population of seniors in American history.”

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The Long-Term Care Imperative is a collaboration of LeadingAge Minnesota and Care Providers of Minnesota, two of the state’s largest long-term care associations. The Long-Term Care Imperative is committed to advancing a shared vision and future for older adult housing, health care and supportive services.

CONTACT: Libbie Chapuran
lchapuran@leadingagemn.org
715-216-1057

Sharing your Random Acts of Kindness can make others more aware of the many opportunities around them to perform random acts of kindness every day. Self Care for Safe Care Random Acts of Kindness Posters can be printed and placed throughout your community to encourage sharing examples of acts of kindness with others. 

The Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS) is seeking proposals from qualified Minnesota Medicaid-certified nursing facilities interested in implementing a resident and family peer support group program.

Care centers have access to an engagement, retention, and leadership building platform for free through a grant for Align’s Employee Engagement Solution. A new grant window opened on Sept. 22 and closes on Nov. 23. Subsequent cycles will open over the next two years.

Offering kind words to others doesn’t just make them feel good. It also gives you a rush of good feelings. That positive energy grows and spreads whenever you share it. Mother Theresa once said, “Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.”

Care centers have access to an engagement, retention, and leadership building platform for free through a grant for Align’s Employee Engagement Solution. A new grant window opened on Sept. 22 and closes on Nov. 23. Subsequent cycles will open over the next two years.

Fall is here again, and so are hot chocolate, cozy sweaters, crackling fires, cool nights, and influenza vaccines!  Long-term care settings should begin planning for annual influenza vaccinations, as they do each fall.

The Living at Home Network has announced that Katie Boller Gosewisch will join the organization as the new executive director.

PHI has released a new annual report on the caregiving workforce. This report focuses on how job quality in our sector has prevented an effective response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Gayle Kvenvold, President and CEO of LeadingAge Minnesota, was recently named a 2021 Most Admired CEO by the Minneapolis / St. Paul Business Journal. In a feature story published on Sept. 7, Gayle drew attention to the workforce shortages long-term care providers are facing:

When you do a Random Act of Kindness, the hormone oxytocin (the “feel good” hormone) is produced in your body.  Studies show that doing a random act of kindness will:

Care centers have access to an engagement, retention, and leadership building platform for FREE through a grant for Align’s Employee Engagement Solution. A new grant window is opening soon, just as the previous cycle is wrapping up.

Audacious Inquiry (Ai), a health information technology firm, is offering to connect with LeadingAge Minnesota nursing home members about a funding opportunity available until Sept. 30 relating to health information exchange.

EduCare’s 5-part Dementia Series is now recognized by the Alzheimer’s Association for successfully completing curriculum review and incorporating its evidenced-based Dementia Care Practice Recommendations in the following topic areas: Alzheimer’s and dementia, person-centered care, assessment and care planning, activities of daily living, and behaviors and communication.

Care centers have only two weeks left to apply for grant funding to implement an employee engagement strategy and improvement program through Align’s Employee Engagement Solution.

CMS approves civil money penalty (CMP) grant dollars to address employee turnover and its impact on the resident experience and quality of life in Minnesota skilled nursing facilities.

Have you posted open positions on the new AgingServicesJobs.Org platform? The new site is now available! Post today and receive an introductory rate of $39 per posting using the coupon code Aging2021 (postings typically $99). This discount will be available to all members for a limited time as we recognize this critical time in building our workforce.

Alana Wright will begin her service as the Minnesota Gerontological Society (MGS) Executive Director on Sept. 13. Alana comes to MGS with 20 years of experience in nonprofit leadership focused on equity, aging services, public/community health, and philanthropy.