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Are Infections Plaguing Your Life?

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Are Infections Plaguing Your Life?

Thinking about the rate of infections that seems to be plaguing us these days makes one wonder what the major cause of this happening is.

We have known for years that overuse of antibiotics has made some bugs resistant…

But could another contributing factor be to do with cleaning standards?

The Problem With Traveling

Now I don’t know if you are a traveler or not, but I hear so often how sick people become after taking a flight.They come back with a virus that they cannot shake.

This happened to me 2 years ago and I seem to hear more and more people in the same situation.

An article came across my desk that the reason for this was due to the quick turnaround of flights…

And the substandard (or should I say non-existent) cleaning that happens to get the plane back in the air again.

I Wouldn’t Leave My House This Way…

The rubbish is cleared but the table tops are not wiped down.

Nothing is done to them.

So you come along and sit down in your allocated seat and pull out your table when you are in the air or to eat.

You are not provided with anything to clean your hands, with the exception of some long haul flights particularly with Asian airlines who bring around heated hand towels.

Read More: The Gross Truth About Germs And Airplanes

Sharing Germs

Just think about it…

The person before you has some virus or bacteria.

They probably cough and splutter all around the space you are now occupying.

Without cleaning your hands, your table or arm rests you are then likely to contaminate yourself with whatever is left behind from the previous occupier.

This Happens Everywhere

Now if this is the problem with travel…

Could sub-standard cleaning be part, if not all, of the problems we are experiencing with superbugs?

I don’t know for sure but to me this stands to reason.

If the bugs are not being cleared from the surfaces, then you and those in your care are going to be at risk.

Sharing The Responsibility

As caregivers we know it.

But do we pass this knowledge on or teach others who do not have our backgrounds and knowledge?

Beyond The Training…

Okay, so a life of caring for children and other people may have set you up with the training you need to keep from getting ill.

But does the rest of the family and anyone that comes to visit understand the importance and the risk to everyone if cleaning standards are substandard?

How often do you reinforce hand washing?

This fun but very real video may bring a bit of a smile at the things we do every day unconsciously that can contribute to infections.

Environmental Cleaning

However I want to focus now on environmental cleaning.

How much time is spent explaining the importance of keeping the environment clean?

How often are the tables, window ledges, beds etc wiped down?

I know when I did my training we had to do ward tidies at the clinic every day on the morning shift.

While we did not have to wash the floors, we were responsible for all the patients’ equipment and surfaces surrounding the patient.

And the same goes for homes where care is given.

Whose Responsibility?

Do we, as caregivers do this today or do we rely on someone else to do it?

How often do we check or observe that is has been done?

How likely is it that the surfaces surrounding your loved ones are harboring bacteria or viruses?

What Are Your Standards?

We know that when there is an outbreak it is likely to indicate a breakdown in cleaning standards.

How easy would it be if all the surfaces were cleaned daily with the expected outcome that the rate of infections would be reduced?

Remember, wherever a group of people live, there is likelihood of increased infections.

The Importance Of A Clean Environment

You see, we spend a lot of time talking about the importance of handwashing…

BUT do we spend the same amount of time on the importance of keeping the environment clean as well?

The following video is really good, but please note while most of the training is in English some of the conversations are in French with sub-titles.

It is 20 mins long but it does show how to clean and how important it is to do it correctly at a clinic, but it can be applied to your home as well:

 

Now this video by Bill Gates is looking at a worldwide epidemic.

He says “The next outbreak? We are not ready.” It is about being prepared and working towards prevention:

Be Prepared

How prepared are you for an outbreak in your home?

I am not necessarily talking about an Ebola outbreak, but a norovirus or influenza outbreak.

I have already talked about the importance of keeping surfaces clean and how this helps to contain or even prevent an outbreak.

Now in a hoe it is on a lesser scale to a worldwide epidemic but the principles are the same, as is the impact on people.

Have you considered how you could prevent an outbreak rather than react to a crisis?

It would be much easier for everyone if more attention was paid to reducing the likelihood of an outbreak in the first place.

Have a parent that’s a little hard to handle? Download our free Challenging Behaviors Guide to discover how you can figure out what’s going on and maintain the relationship with your parent.

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The 5 Levels Of Training Evaluation

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The 5 Levels Of Training EvaluationI want to take the time to talk a little about evaluating your training.

Did you know that there are actually 5 levels that need to be evaluated?

To make sure the training is effective, these are the levels you should be assessing to know if what you’re doing is working or if you need a new solution.

Level 1

This level of evaluation is done immediately after a training session. You have probably all done these from time to time.

Emma Weber, the author of Turning Learning Into Action, calls these the “happy sheets”. They are the reaction type based evaluation.

Once the training is complete, take a look around the room to see how everyone feels. Happy? Exhausted? A little bit smarter hopefully?

Level 2

A little bit more in depth than Level 1, you need to find out…

What do participants know? What has the person learned from the training or retained from other learning?

Core competencies could come into this. By this I mean you send out an annual sheet for the staff to complete about what they know on a particular topic.

Or it could be you set a questionnaire at the end of an in-service – if you don’t already have one in the training session.

Level 3

This is the behavior-based level of evaluation, and where we start to get to the meat of training evaluation.

Even though many people stop after Level 2, this is where you really start to discover if your training is effective.

Ask yourself.. What are people doing differently as a result of the training?

Why do you need to ask this?

Because this is the glue that cements the learning.

This should really be the true aim of learning – to change or improve behavior.

And you need to know… did it happen in your training? With your staff?

Level 4

At Level 4 we take our evaluation to the big picture level.

What are the results of the training? What effect has the training had on the business or environment?

Level 5

And finally ROI, or Return On Investment.

What impact has the training had on the bottom line?

Back To The Glue…

Now I want to focus for a little on Level 3 because I think this is what can make the biggest difference to levels 4 and 5.

How can you measure this?

What can you do to find out what they have learned and not just from a competency assessment or worksheet that they do at the time of training, before or after?

The Power Of A Case Study

My suggestion is to set a group case study.

Divide the staff into groups of 4 or 5 and set them a task to explore from the learning they have just done or a real life experience that has happened in your facility/organization.

A Case Study Example

Complaints topic: Use a complaint you have received and get them to analyze the complaint (like you the manager or RN have had to do).

Go through the process of communicating with the complainant, write a letter to the person, examine how it could have been avoided and so forth.

This will make them more aware of complaints and enhance the learning.

Example 2

Sensory System – Vision: A client may have macular degeneration. As a Case Study, get them define clearly what it is and how they could make life easier for a person with it.

Include getting them to sit and talk to the client about it and how it affects them, and what they need to do to help them.

This would then give them a better appreciation of what it is like to have this condition.

Real Life Examples

There are no end of real life situations that happen in your facility or organization.

Make it a fun and practical exercise. Give them time to complete and present it to you or even at a staff meeting.

What better way to enhance the learning of your staff than use something they can relate to and begin to use immediately?

Need a head start in changing up your training? Get these printable Infection Control Protocols to share with your team and learn how to deal with 19 different infections & communicable diseases in your care facility.

Creating A Safe Workplace

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Creating A Safe WorkplaceRecently I talked about collaboration in the workplace and the importance of camaraderie.

This week I want to extend this out to working with other businesses and how to make your workplace a safe place. If we work with others, the “whole is greater than its parts” as Aristotle says.

So What Does This Mean?

This means that the synergy we create by working together will bring greater results.

That is… Synergy is the creation of a whole that is greater than the simple sum of its parts according to Wikipedia.

How Synergy Works

So what am I talking about and how does this work? Well it is simple really.

If we all work together, whether it is in your own workplace or working with other workplaces then everyone wins. A collective action takes place that is picked up by the energy forces that can only create good and more for all.

Ok, so you think I am off my rocker? That’s okay! All I want you to do is expand your thinking.

And instead of looking inward in your business, look outside of it to see who you can work collaboratively with to create a synergy.

Synergy In Action

In 1909, Lester F Ward said “struggle is essentially destructive to social order and that social synergy, which is a form of cosmic synergy, the universal constructive principle of nature”.

An example of this co-operative power of nature is water. It is made up of two compounds that work together to create one of the essentials of life, water.

They are of course hydrogen and oxygen. This is synergy in action.

Synergy With Competitors

Now there are many such examples with nature. So if we are one with nature, why can it not work for us?

A synergistic partnership with your so called competitors can relate to all of you winning – the whole is great than the sum.

Synergy is the ability of a group to outperform even its best individual members. A cohesive group working as a team will get better results than one person working on their own.

Ask Yourself…

Are a leader in your organization that puts your people first?

Or are you an authority that puts yourself first?

Have you created a team that is willing to work with you or do they see themselves as working for you? Do you make your staff feel safe or so they fear you?

If you looked at your staff as if they were your child, would you fire them or even want to fire them? Do you sacrifice the people to save the numbers or save the people to save the numbers?

You Can’t Do It Without Your Team

The reality is that your people are your greatest asset.

All great leaders put their people first. They build an environment where people are safe and when they break the rules or make a mistake, they know they are not going to lose their job.

They know they are going to be coached and their job is safe, they are safe, their family is safe because they know they are going to be fed.

Take a look at this Ted Talk to see what I mean:

https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_why_good_leaders_make_you_feel_safe
(11mins)

Local Synergy

Group homes know this. The power of working together sets up a collegial environment, but this can also work locally.

Meeting with others from your area on a regular basis creates synergy, or an energy that works for everyone.

But are all managers in these groups’ leaders? Do you trust them or fear them? Do you feel safe or unsafe?

It is the leaders in your group or community that sets the tone that does the extraordinary in ordinary everyday situations.

The groups that meet do not have to be from the same organisation or industry. There is nothing to say that homecare organisations, residential care organisations, disability facilities/organisations, mental health, educators or health agencies can’t all meet up.

You all have something to contribute to the group. It comes to the power of the leader who sets up the group that is the key to its longevity.

Are you in a group like this? I am. It keeps me in touch with what is happening in the industry and I meet up with old friends too. So why don’t you get in touch with those around you and work together. You just never know what may eventuate from them.

Want to join Care Training Online?
Get started with these printable Infection Control Protocols that you can share with your team and learn how to deal with 19 different infections & communicable diseases in your care facility.

Benefits Of Camaraderie?

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Benefits Of Camaraderie?One cannot underestimate the value of camaraderie. The more we value each other, the better we all work together.

It never ceases to amaze me how so few people actually get this concept.

The fact is if we do not feel what we are doing has some value to others (and ourselves), then our will to work collaboratively for the good of everyone just dissipates. It disappears.

The Unhealthy Result

We all needs friends be it at work or outside of work. It is part of human nature.

While work friends may be different to outside of work friends we all need people to talk to and to share the good, the bad and the trivial with.

If we cannot do this, we bottle things up inside and unhealthy stress is the result.

The Nature Of Bullying

Bullying also causes unnecessary stress.

This is usually done by people who have low self-esteem, feel insecure in their job, are pressured in their work by those above or believe they are better than they are at their job.

They try to compensate for their own insecurities or short falls in the belief that bullying someone else will make them feel more powerful, look better than they are or make them feel better…

When in actual fact, the opposite occurs.

You will never get anyone to work well or better through fear. It is not possible.

It just builds up resentment, anger, and frustration that works against you rather than for you.

Conflict In Your Organization

How do handle conflict in your organization?

Do you face conflict and deal with it or do you avoid it?

Do you let it fester or manage it?

Have a look at this video on transferring conflict into collaboration in healthcare:

The Importance Of Workplace Culture

So what sort of culture do you have in your workplace?

Is it a collaborative or divisive?

Is it one of universal respect or a dog eat dog mentality?

Is it one where everyone contributes and is respected for the contribution they make… where everyone wins or do you work on a lose, lose principle?

How To Turn It Around

Have you considered what makes people feel good about their work?

Well if you watch this video of the same name, just may make you consider your employees and or peers more (Really worth watching if you want to get the best out of your staff)…

Successful Groups

Now to follow on from camaraderie, let’s look at what makes successful groups.

Successful groups are those that have a high degree of social connectedness where people talk to each other and get to know each other. A group that fosters helpfulness because when the going gets tough it will be helpfulness that pulls you through.

A workplace that develops and fosters a culture of helpfulness is far more successful that a culture that rewards stars.

So developing camaraderie among your staff, where a culture of helpfulness and encouragement will give a company momentum and makes them robust.

What creates a successful group? Have a look at this video…

The answers may surprise you!

Get these printable Infection Control Protocols to share with your team and learn how to deal with 19 different infections & communicable diseases in your care facility.

Are We Inadvertently Killing Our Elderly?

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are-we-inadvertently-killing-our-elderly

While I don’t want to be an alarmist, this series that came out in 2002, albeit a while ago, it is still relevant today I believe: http://www.ccfj.net/NHSTLseries.html

So why should I bring this up now?

You will all be experiencing the heat wave we are going through at the moment and probably finding you are drinking more fluids than you would perhaps normally.

However it is good to remember that the older one gets the less likely they are to reach for or call for a glass of water. From the age of 60 thirst becomes blunted which quite simply means they don’t feel thirsty.

Therefore it is up to us as caregivers to think for our patients and offer fluids very frequently – at least 50 mls an hour, to enable them to remain hydrated.

Signs And Symptoms

To remind you of the signs and symptoms of dehydration check out this video:

However there are two early signs left off this list: falls and headaches.

Just think about how you feel when you are out in the hot sun and haven’t had a drink.

Now I know you get very busy and it is not easy to remember all the little things that need to be done.

But if a person does not ask for a drink, then it is likely to be forgotten or overlooked.

Failing to give a person adequate fluids is abuse though, as you will see in this blog article: http://www.nursinghomesabuseblog.com/dehydration/

Take Extra Care

On top of this, if a person dies as a result of dehydration, then you are likely to be culpable or blameworthy as the death could have been prevented as you can see in this article: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11317558

Admittedly the nurse here appears to have had inadequate supervision.

But at the end of the day, two basics in the care of the elderly need to be understood by all your staff…

  • As people age their thirst becomes blunted
  • They are unlikely to ask for a drink

So if you don’t ensure they have enough fluid they may quietly slip away from you and die.

This can be labeled as abuse, and the neglect and death from dehydration is preventable.

Learn more here:

Get Creative In Providing Fluids

So how can you very simply provide fluid for those in your care?

  • Have fluid rounds in addition to the normal morning, afternoon tea and supper
  • Offer ice blocks sometimes as a variety
  • Watermelons are very inexpensive at certain times of year and it a very enjoyable way to help with hydration
  • Jelly is another easy way to get people to take fluids

Have a discussion among your colleagues and see what other enjoyable ways you can get fluid into people. You may be surprised at what you come up with.

More Resources

At a recent workshop I was at on fluid and electrolyte balance the presenter talked about an excellent book you may be interested in.  “Fluid & Electrolyte Balance – Nursing Considerations” by Norma Metheny which can be purchased here: http://www.jblearning.com/catalog/9780763781644/

And of course for Care Training Online members it may be timely for you to review, do or redo the Hydration topic online.

Have a parent that’s a little hard to handle? Download our free Challenging Behaviors Guide to discover how you can figure out what’s going on and maintain the relationship with your parent.

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Is Your Training Actually Effective (Or Just Wasting Time)?

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I want to take time to talk a little about evaluating your training. There are actually 5 levels of training that need to be evaluated.

Level 1
This is done immediately after a training session. In fact, you have probably all done these from time to time.

Emma Weber, the author of Turning Learning Into Action, calls these the “happy sheets”. They are the reaction type based evaluation.

Level 2
What do participants know? What has the person learned from the training or retained from other learning?

Core competencies could come into this level. By which I mean you send out an annual sheet for the staff to complete about what they know on a particular topic.

Or if you don’t already have one in the training session you could set a questionnaire at the end of an inservice.

Level 3
What are people doing differently as a result of the training?

This is behavior based. IT IS GLUE THAT CEMENTS THE LEARNING. This should be the aim of learning – to change or improve behavior.

Level 4
What are the results of the training? What effect has the training had on the business or environment?

Level 5
ROI – what impact has it had on the bottom line?

Now I want to focus a little on Level 3 because I think this is what can make the biggest difference to levels 4 and 5.

How can you measure this? What can you do to find out what they have learned, and not just from a competency assessment or worksheet that they do at the time of training or before or after?

My suggestion is to set a group case study.

Divide the staff into groups of 4 or 5 and set them a task to explore from the learning they have just done or a real life experience that has happened in your facility/organization.

Example 1:  Complaints topic:
Use a complaint you have received and get them to analyse the complaint (like you the manager or RN have had to do), go through the process of communicating with the complainant, write a letter to the person, examine how it could have been avoided and so forth. This will make them more aware of complaints and enhance the learning.

Example 2: Sensory System – Vision:
A client may have macular degeneration. As a Case Study, get them to define clearly what it is and how they could make life easier for a person with the disease.  Include getting them to sit and talk to the client about the disease, how it affects them and what they need to do to help them. This gives a better appreciation of what it is like to have this condition.

There are numerous real life situations that occur in your facility or organization that you can use as a fun and practical exercise.

Give groups time to complete the project and present to you or even at a staff meeting.  What better way to enhance the learning of your staff?

While I could put scenario examples in Care Training Online that you could use, what more effective way than using your organization’s own real life examples with people you already know.

Ready to start effectively training your team?
Get these printable Infection Control Protocols to share with your team and learn how to deal with 19 different infections & communicable diseases in your care facility.

A Quick Trick To Keep Learners Interested

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A Quick Trick To Keep Learners InterestedHave you ever wondered why training may be ineffective in your organization? The answer lies in the one you are teaching.

At What Point In A Training
Does A Learner Stops
Paying Attention?  

Neurologists all give slightly different answers but the average appears to be around 7-20 minutes.

So with an hour long training session, unless you keep learners interested or do something different in that hour to bring their back to the session, you can expect the learner will miss out on a lot of information.

Unless you create smaller sections of time and facilitate the training, you have probably done nothing more than tick the box that you have trained staff (or some of them) on a topic required for your contracts.

But there will be few benefits to the care being given or to saving you time by caregivers knowing what to do and doing it right.

How And When Should You Stimulate Interest?

Every 10 minutes you should have an exercise, stimulate discussion or provide a quiz.

Do something that is going to help your staff sit up and take notice again or bring their attention back.

With Care Training Online, you can pause the video and discuss a real situation or stimulate with some form of question.

Why Is Group Learning Better Able To Stimulate The Learner?

“Every time something changes in the training room, you reboot the learner’s attention AND increase their retention of information and decrease difficult learner behaviours” says Derek Rowe a Melbourne based training consultant.

This is where you come in. How can you reboot your learners to retain what they have learned? What do you need to do to stimulate the learner?

For me the most logical way is to discuss a person in your care that maybe be causing a problem or may have had a problem solved.

It could also be a complaint that was received: retrace the steps in the restraint process to see at what point it went wrong and became a problem.

When people relate training to personal experiences or stories, the retention is greater.

REMEMBER: All stage plays and films have a director. Running a training session is just the same. YOU are the director.

So when teaching your caregivers, the best way to get a person to learn and retain information is to “Provide them with real life experiences that become indexed in their memory. Comprehension comes when the learner draws inferences that are relevant and correct,” say Jenny Swain, Educator and Learning Designer.

For all of you who are struggling with caregivers doing things wrong or you are continually fighting fires, the only solution is to invest in learning and development for you staff.

As I said earlier, abdication of this responsibility and ticking the box to satisfy auditors will not save you time; it will compound your problem.

Take a look at this video to help understand how people learn. It really puts it into perspective..

Start training effectively with these printable Infection Control Protocols.
Share them with your team and learn how to deal with 19 different infections & communicable diseases in your care facility.

Why Students Forget 70% Of What They Learned Within 24 Hours

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Have you heard of the forgetting curve? Have you perhaps experienced it?

You know what I mean. You attend a fantastic training session or workshop, leave all fired up with what you want to do with the new information…

And then BINGO you hit the reality of work and suddenly you have forgotten everything you wanted to implement.

Research tells us that on average students forget 70% of what they learned within 24 hours of the course.

This article is extremely interesting and got me thinking about what we can do to help people remember rather than forget what they have learned.

There will be things that may not necessarily be important to you or the student but as a manager or educator you want to make sure you get the best bang for the buck you’ve spent.

Well don’t you? I know I do. So how can this work or what can we do at Clinical Update and Care Training Online?

For those of you who are using Care Training Online, why don’t you give your students a retest of the worksheet after they have done the topic or segment to see what they have learned?

Another option may be for you to devise a quick quiz for them to do 24 hours after the topic. Or give them their certificate to write down what they have learned.

In the future we are going to be devising brief online quizzes to go with each Care Training Online topic but until this happens, use what resources that are currently available to you.

I have been thinking about how we can help retention learning with Clinical Updates as well. What can we do to stem the forgetting curve?

I will be discussing it with our trainers but in the meantime, before we go to each break, I will get you to write down the main points you got from each 2 hour (approx.) session.

Now it may be that I can get the trainers to put together a quick quiz at the end of each 2 hour block.

However, my goal is that every caregiver (including registered and enrolled nurses as well as caregivers) will be the best you can be.

This also means helping you use the knowledge you receive in a constructive way that provides the best care you can give and to feel empowered personally with your new or revisited knowledge.

If you want to read more on the Benefits of Testing the Memory go here.

OR  Click here to learn more about The Power of Testing Memory.

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