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| Project Title: | Collaboration for Homecare Advances in Management and Practice (CHAMP) |
| Project Start Date: | October 1, 2004 |
| Key Project Staff: |
Penny Hollander Feldman, Ph.D., Principal Investigator |
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Background: This program addresses a series of interrelated problems that have led to suboptimal geriatric care for many home healthcare, namely: 1) Home care nurses are inadequately prepared in geriatric care; 2) Continuing education for home health nurses is variable and outmoded; 3) Home healthcare managers lack the management and teaching skills necessary to help them supervise and support nurses in achieving improved outcomes for geriatric patients; and 4) Inadequate training and staff development opportunities for home healthcare managers and nurses detract from job satisfaction and quality of care for older persons. Purpose: The purpose of this initiative is to improve care for older patients served by home health agencies and to embed in those agencies the capacity for continuous practice improvement. The specific aim is to develop and test a sustainable training model for frontline managers in home healthcare agencies. In turn, the nurses they manage will be equipped to employ "best geriatric practices" in the care of their older patients. Successful development and implementation of the training program, to be conducted over a four-year project period, should reach approximately 300 frontline managers, 3000 nurses under their supervision, and 150,000 to 200,000 older patients in the short run. Established on a permanent basis, the reach of the program should be far greater. More information on the CHAMP Program can be found at www.champ-program.org Study Design: The foundation for this initiative is an enhanced "train the trainer" model. The emphasis of the model will be on 1) implementation of geriatric best practices, 2) use of quality improvement (QI) and measurement tools and skills to track progress in implementation, and 3) techniques for integrating best practices into frontline care. Specifically the project will:
Results Program ReachCHAMP has developed and successfully implemented two courses in topics critical to geriatric home care; Medication Management and Pain Management. Approximately 175 frontline managers in 50 agencies from across the country have completed the first two offerings of Medication Management. In addition, fifty-five participants from 16 agencies have graduated from the inaugural Geriatric Pain Management course. The three CHAMP course offerings combined have reached approximately 1,930 field nurses and approximately 125,750 patients. Program Results Patient care is significantly better after participation CHAMP. For agencies who participated in the Medication Management course:
Publications: Sponsors: The Atlantic Philanthropies with the Visiting Nurses Association of America |
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