Category: Tools & Resources

Nurses are highly susceptible to burnout due to the high care levels they are required to provide. How can nurse wellness prevent staff turnover?

Nursing job growth hit 7% in 2019, which is much faster than the national average. Yet, nursing shortages are rampant in health care organizations,and skilled nursing facilities are no different. 

You might see these same staff turnover trends at your own nursing home or LTCF.. But the good news is that you can reduce or even eliminate turnover at your facility with only a few changes. Learn more below. 

The Nursing Home Staff Turnover Dilemma

By now, you may be wondering: what’s so bad about being short a few nurses? Can’t the rest of your staff make up for the turnover?

Here are the top three reasons high nurse turnover could be negatively impacting your nursing home.

1. Nurse Turnover Costs You Money

A 2020 study found that for each percent change in RN turnover, the average facility gains or loses over $306,000 per year. 

High turnover rates mean you’re constantly losing money on training and retraining staff. And that’s not even to mention the direct losses businesses incur in employee exit costs.

Also, consider the lost productivity while you’re searching for new nurses. Fewer nurses can affect employee morale and, ultimately, impact your residents.

Experience matters and a lack of experience is expensive.

2. Turnover Affects Resident Outcomes

During the COVID pandemic, a study found that overall patient infections were 15% more likely when nursing staff was down. This phenomenon also applies to geriatric care nurses, if not more so. 

The national average ratio of nursing home RNs to residents is 45 minutes of RN time per resident in the nursing home. Studies show that higher staffing levels, lead to  fewer negative health outcomes, including:

• Pressure ulcers
• UTIs
• Hospitalizations
• Falls
• Moderate to severe pain

This study indicates that higher fulfillment in nursing capacity results in better outcomes for residents. And the healthier your residents, the fewer DPH survey tags your facility will receive. 

3. High Turnover Leads to Burnout

High staff turnover leads to nurse burnout. This is because having fewer employees means each nurse has to carry extra weight, often pulling additional shifts to meet the needs of residents. That’s not all, though.

In time, burnout leads nurses to seek work elsewhere. The turnover rate at your nursing home then increases, your existing nurses get burnt out, too, and the vicious cycle continues. 

Why Is Your Facility Experiencing Nurse Turnover?

Before you can fix your own nursing shortage, you need to understand its root causes. Research has uncovered two top reasons why nursing home nurses leave their jobs. 

Nurses Feel Overworked and Undervalued

As we mentioned, when nursing vacancies are high due to high turnover, each nurse must take on an increased workload. Doing more work may be sustainable for a little while. But, over time, the stress can add up and lead to burnout.

Burnout can lead to serious mental health conditions. It manifests itself as extreme fatigue, dreading work, and feeling undervalued. If left unaddressed, burnout can lead to depression, anxiety, and increase absenteeism or lead to an increase in disability claims.

Often, nurses who experience burnout quit their jobs. They seek alternative employment where they hope staff wellness needs will be better met. 

Caring for Older Adults Can Be Challenging

Not all nurses at your facility have experience caring for older adult patients. Many nurses have little training in providing basic care to older adults. 

And that’s problematic since eldercare presents many unique challenges that other nursing specialties do not face. For instance:

• How to foster appropriate nursing home environments
• How to respect the humanity of older adults
• How to care for aging adults with memory and behavioral disorders

Failing to properly educate nurses and provide them with skills training in geriatric care can quickly lead to the loss of top talent. Highly skilled nurses will pick up the slack for their less-skilled peers, leading to burnout and the loss of these valuable employees. 

How to Reduce Turnover at Your Nursing Home

Finally, the good news: workplace interventions can reduce burnout and thus turnover at your nursing home. Here are our top tips for reducing turnover at your nursing home. 

Hire More Nurses

When you have enough nurses on staff, your employees feel less overworked. And when they feel less overworked, they will be less prone to burnout.

This is why the first step to reducing turnover at your nursing home is to hire more nurses. This is easier said than done but must remain a top priority.

One recent review found that higher nurse-to-nursing home resident ratios led to improved nurse satisfaction. And higher nurse satisfaction, in turn, led to decreased staff turnover. 

Incentivize High-Performing Staff

Once you hire all those new nurses, how do you hold onto them? Workplace incentives can help keep staff motivated and boost nurse morale. 

A 2018 study looked at the effects of rewards on employees. Those nurses incentivized immediately after good behavior and who received rewards frequently were more motivated to complete even the most minute workplace tasks.

Further, eventually removing those incentives didn’t diminish the effect on morale. The researchers determined that this showed how immediate rewards can foster long-term job satisfaction and decrease turnover. 

Provide Professional Development

Providing skills training and professional development for nurses is an excellent way to retain talent. Your staff can maximize their skills, grow their knowledge base, and learn techniques for dealing with complicated patient groups. 

The Engage with™ Skills Training Program is an online training program that can teach your nurses skills specific to older adults that they can use in the workplace. Our program uses evidence-based training to provide your staff with the skills they need to work with older adults. 

Engage with™ Skills Training Programs can help you boost employee satisfaction and improve staff interactions with your residents. And this skills training has been shown to reduce turnover by up to 40%. 

Get Engage with™ Skills Training for Your Nursing Home

Nurse turnover is costing you money and affecting patient outcomes. But the good news is that there are solutions. Hiring more nurses, offering employee incentives, and providing nurses with skills training have been shown to help reduce turnover.

Ready to try Engage with™ Skills Training? Contact us today and finally stop stressing about nursing staff turnover at your skilled nursing facility.

Reducing Staff Turnover and Improving Wellness in Care Facilities

The healthcare industry is experiencing a turnover crisis. Learn more in this guide to reducing staff turnover and improving staff wellness in long-term care facilities

Retaining good nurses is an ongoing problem for senior living facilities. The turnover crisis was serious before the pandemic hit, and it continues to grow.

When there aren’t enough nurses, the rest of the staff is overworked and stretched thinly. This is bad for the staff, bad for business, and even worse for the residents.

Facilities that retain a quality nursing staff provide better care to their residents and peace of mind to their family members. A focus on improving nurse staff wellness and providing ongoing education can help in reducing older adults’ nursing staff turnover.

Here’s a look at some strategies for meeting the needs of your nursing staff.

Start With the Hiring Process

The first step for retaining nurses is to remember they are in high demand. A strong onboarding and orientation process is necessary.

Make sure job descriptions are updated and realistic. Do not wait for vacancies.

Line up quality talent ahead of time. Look for someone who wants a long-term position and has the dedication and physical abilities to handle the demands of the job.

Check references and do a thorough background check. Make sure they understand the company’s values and their unique role in the organization.

Make them feel welcome, supported, and valued from day one.

Allow a potential hire to shadow a seasoned staff person around for a shift.  The last thing anyone wants is to go through the time and expense of recruiting and training a nurse, only to find they were not prepared for the job.  No one wins when a nurse leaves because they didn’t understand the job they were actually being hired to do.

Offer a Competitive Salary and Benefits

The pay for senior care nurses is often lower than in other medical specialties. This is one reason senior care employees are often looking for something better.

You want to attract nurses looking for long-term employment. Offering a competitive wage, performance-based bonuses, decent benefits, and regular paid time off is a huge incentive for nurses.

Competitive pay and good benefits attract good nurses. This can have a significant effect on morale and boost chances for retaining quality nursing staff.

Get creative with benefits.  For instance, a cell phone allowance can amount to a small yearly cost, but can pay big dividends in the areas of appreciation, recognition and ultimately, retention. 

Implement Fair Scheduling

Once you’ve hired a quality team, it’s important to keep them. Beyond a fair salary and competitive benefits, you must consider workload and scheduling.

Nurses who feel their employer respects them and considers their needs are more likely to stay in their position longer. Although you cannot guarantee all schedule requests, do your best to allow people to request the shifts most desirable to them.

Offering flexible schedules and promoting a healthy work-life balance shows you care about your nursing staff and their health.

Provide Advancement Opportunities

Investing in your staff is an investment in the company and the residents, as well. When staff members see there’s a ladder for advancement and salary increases, it’s a strong incentive to stay.

Career development and ongoing education boost employees’ skills, as well as their confidence. It provides an avenue for continual improvement, which benefits staff and residents alike.

A highly trained nursing staff is a valuable asset. Providing a path for advancement is a way to retain quality staff for the long-term and show them you value their skills and talents.

Enlist the Help of Technology  

No matter the experience level, everyone can learn and improve their skill set. Identify areas that need improvement and ask your employees what they need as well.

Ongoing education that reinforces the company’s goals and mission helps employees feel empowered and connected to their workplace. Training through technology is cost-effective and user-friendly.

Technology enables nurses to train at convenient times without sacrificing patient care. Dedicated nurses are willing to learn and eager to improve resident care.

When nurses feel they have the training, skills and tools they need to provide quality care, it’s one more incentive for them to stay.

Promote Structured Mentorship

Nurses and CNA’s need support. One of the most important ways to retain quality staff is to provide a support network from day one.

A mentorship program is critical for new hires and provides a source for advice and a sounding board when they need it. Putting a new employee to work in an eldercare facility without any support is a recipe for disaster.

Without support, nurses may become overwhelmed with the unique struggles of eldercare. Ongoing support is critical for job satisfaction and staff wellness for those caring for and engaging with older adults..

Share in Decision Making

Nurses care about the continuity and quality of healthcare they’re able to provide. And most nurses want a voice in best practices.

Involving the staff in decision-making allows them to voice their feelings and concerns about what matters to them. When nurses feel their voice is valued, it fosters a sense of ownership and empowerment.

Provide opportunities for nurses to share their input on policy decisions and resident care. The more invested they feel in their profession, the more likely they are to stay.  

Lead by Example

The level of support from administrators is a huge factor in retaining nursing staff. Effective leaders understand this, value their employees, and lead by example.

Some qualities of successful healthcare administrators include:

• A proactive approach
• An open-door policy for staff members
• An emphasis on ongoing education and training
• Concern for employee wellbeing and job satisfaction
• Appreciation and respect for all staff members

When nurses respect their administrators, they have more job satisfaction and more incentive to stay on the job.

Establish a Close-Knit Team

When employees feel a sense of connectedness, they feel as though they have a family at work. This makes work a more welcome place to come each day.

Creating a family atmosphere is a great way to make your employees happy and keep them around. Investing in training, career advancement, mentorship, and employee empowerment is key to retaining excellent staff members.

Team building and opportunities for socializing among employees promote a close-knit team. This increases job satisfaction and a sense of belonging that promotes long-term retention.

Value a Healthy Lifestyle

Healthy employees make for happy employees. Wellness perks can be a big incentive for employees. 

Providing a place or the opportunity for employees to exercise or engage in team sports promotes a sense of wellness. When you take measures to reduce workplace stress and address mental health concerns, you show employees you care about their wellbeing.

Promoting a healthy work-life balance is good for boosting morale and reducing nursing staff turnover.

Reducing Older Adults’ Nursing Staff Turnover

The demand for nurses is high and is only expected to grow. This makes it harder for long-term care facilities to attract and retain quality nurses.

If you expect nurses to provide quality care, you must also take care of your nurses. There’s no one solution for reducing older adults’ nursing staff turnover.

Instead, there are many ways you can support and nurture your nursing staff. Make a concerted effort to train, mentor, and reward them. This helps to increase job satisfaction and retain excellent nurses for years to come.  

Engage With provides interactive training with a focus on providing skilled nurses with the necessary skills training to confidently care for and engage with residents in long-term care facilities. Our Older Adults Skills Training program has been proven to reduce staff turnover by up to 40% in long-term care facilities. Contact us to learn more.