Linda Pierce says in doing so, each home will determine what they do best and then embrace it accordingly.

“We do network with a couple of homes in our area,” says Linda. “Just lately,” she adds, “we presented the OLTCA (Ontario Long Term Care) cards to our MPP along with two other homes from our area.”

Linda says she really felt there was support for each other during this exercise. “To spend time with them was an asset. We don’t do this enough with each other, to share success stories and our mutual challenges,” Linda explains.

The administrator says they are trying to raise the profile of Village Green in the community overall. A chile festival will be held on Saturday, for instance, and the local newspaper has been there twice to do stories on what the home has been up to.

With accreditation dominating April, Linda believes once the month is over three areas will dominate at Village Green – supportive measures, mutidose and the Tena disposable incontinence program. “A changing environment will always lead to areas of resistance,” says Linda. “But if we can communicate the value of these things, it makes all the difference.”

“For instance, supportive measures has really been embraced here. We have 24 staff who received the education and hopefully we will be sending two more to the specialist training which will begin this spring,” she says.

As for the multidose system (where drugs are pre-packaged in individualized strips of medication by a pharmacy) Village Green has been eager to take on this project. “Staff have been very positive here about the prospect of having multidose begin,” says Linda. The system will be introduced at the home sometime in early Spring.

“We understand there were some hiccups along the way with multidose,” Linda says, “so we hope we’re ready to work through whatever glitches may come up so that we can benefit from the system,” she says.

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The Tena project (lead by Candace Yeo from home office) is also eagerly anticipated. Village Green has heard from other homes that it has improved staff morale overall and has enhanced residents’ sleep patterns. The downside for staff in housekeeping, notes Linda, is that the Tena project will reduce laundry by 40 per cent, which means the department’s hours will be cut back some.

Also next month, the aftermath of the case mix index numbers from the Province indicate the home has to cut nursing hours by 10 hours per day.

“We have had to have good team discussions about these things,” says Linda, “because nobody likes to face the prospect of reduced hours.”

Village Green turns 25 this year, says Linda, and the home is proud of what it has accomplished. “We’re looking forward to all these wonderful changes.”