Hospitals take the lead in quality elder care with participation in LTP

NICHE Announces February 2012 Leadership Training Program

New York, NY – January 12, 2012 -- NICHE (Nurses Improving Care for Healthsystem Elders) announces the February 2012 Leadership Training Program (LTP). The LTP trains an interdisciplinary hospital team to begin the process of increasing the quality of care for older adult patients at their facility and achieving NICHE designation status. Registration information for the six-week, online LTP starting February 13, 2012 is available at www.nicheprogram.org/join-leadership_training_program.

According to the Merck Manual, in 2002, older adults accounted for 12.7 million (41 percent) of the 31.7 million hospitalizations in the United States, and these numbers are expected to increase significantly as the population ages. Better preparing hospital staff to meet the special needs of this group is the goal of NICHE and the Leadership Training Program.

The LTP offers a distance learning option where participants engage in a rigorous program delivered via a web-based platform and facilitated by the NICHE team. The program includes webinars, mentoring by NICHE faculty, on-demand access to tools and more. In all, 96 hospitals and over 400 individuals attended the online LTP since its inception in September 2009. There are almost 300 NICHE hospitals in North America.

The LTP provides:

• On-demand access to comprehensive program topics including: The NICHE Toolkit, NICHE models, staff education elements, Geriatric Institutional Assessment Profile (GIAP), and other clinical, financial, and organizational measurement approaches to evaluate program effectiveness

• Action plan development session and other project management tools essential to implementing a system-wide geriatric initiative

Three people responsible for steering the NICHE initiative at the facility should attend the LTP session. This typically includes a nurse clinician leader, a clinical educator, and an administrator, manager or quality person. NICHE designated hospitals can use this opportunity to train additional staff for their NICHE team.

The session cost is $4,950 per hospital, which covers the three initial LTP participants and all program materials. Additional participants are $350 each.

The Geriatric Institutional Assessment Profile, an extensive web-based assessment of the hospital’s readiness to implement geriatric programs, is included in the program at no cost. Participating hospitals also receive registration fees for one participant to attend the pre-conference workshops at the Annual Conference and discounts for attendance at the annual NICHE conference.

Upon designation as a NICHE facility, hospitals pay an annual designation fee that includes access to a vast array of resources, ongoing evaluation tools, professional mentoring, and access to the NICHE community. 

About NICHE

NICHE (Nurses Improving Care for Healthsystem Elders) program is designed to help hospitals improve the care of older adults. A program of the Hartford Institute for Geriatric Nursing at New York University College of Nursing, the vision of NICHE is for all patients 65-and-over to be given sensitive and exemplary care. The mission of NICHE is to provide principles and tools to stimulate a change in the culture of health care facilities to achieve patient-centered care for older adults. For more information, visit www.nicheprogram.org.

 

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Press Contact

Christopher James
Christopher James
(212) 998-6876