Sarah Wells
NCCNHR: The National Consumer Voice for Quality Long-Term Care has named Sarah F. Wells its new executive director. Wells will oversee the daily operations of the organization, lead fundraising efforts, and continue NCCNHR’s unique role since 1975 as the only national consumer advocacy organization whose sole mission is improving the quality of care and life of the elderly and people with disabilities.
Wells spent nearly a decade at Women In Government (WIG), a national, nonprofit organization providing public policy education for women state legislators, where she most recently served as Vice President. While at WIG, Wells helped increase the organization’s operating budget, establish a public policy department, and lead numerous policy initiatives.
She is taking the position vacated by Alice H. Hedt, who joined the NCCNHR staff in 1998 and served as Executive Director since 2004.
NCCNHR recently submitted recommendations to the Obama Administration (pdf) that included a call for increased presidential leadership on nursing home quality, improved staffing of licensed nurses and nurse aides to create employment and improve care, and increased nurse aide training from 75 to 160 hours.
How will you make this advanced training affordable for students to enroll? Will this change the turnover in the field of nursing? Money talks – the positions need to paid a hospital based wage. Nursing Homes continually see the State budget deficit published. So where does the nursing home get the money to make these positions attractive financially?
An increase in the certification requirement for nurse aides does not necessarily translate to greater costs. My organization’s studies have likewise concluded that certification requirement are generally too low (they vary by state, though must be at least the 75-hour federally mandated minimum), leaving too many nurse aides woefully unprepared for the job – both in terms of skills required and being mentally prepared for the work they will be doing. It is important to note that when we speak about requirements we talk about specific components of a CNA curriculum; it is not just an increase in the number of hours. In reality, many courses are already over 150 hours. They often are just not providing adequate content in that time frame. Many of the proprietary school (non-nursing home) courses were actually well over 150 hours.
Regarding nursing homes getting the money to pay staff adequately, one option could be putting less money into administration and other areas of the nursing home that don’t benefit residents and cutting back on profits.