Whose Home Is This Anyway? Resident Rights Education

Abstract

Abstract Healthcare organizations struggle with educating staff on the same topics and issues in a meaningful way year after year. At The Jewish Home and Hospital in New York City, the Social Work and Staff Development departments collaborated on a unique staff training program for all employees. Using exercises and scenarios developed from actual situations, all staff were trained in ensuring residents rights–specifically how they could empower themselves and their peers to create an ongoing healthcare culture which supports Residents Rights. Every session ended with a written personal pledge from each staff member to change one negative behavior that impacted on the residents' day-to-day experience. Creating training that addresses the specific and unique needs of each facility is always a challenge. In order to overcome this challenge, this training strategy allows staff to identify barriers within the agency that create conflicts among staff, residents and residents' families. This identification lead...