Homecare is a field where management innovation is very advanced. The challenges are great, and the answers must be relevant.
Challenge
The age pyramid clearly shows that the proportion of elderly people in Switzerland is increasing, due to the low fertility rate and increasing life expectancy. Moreover, the entry into retirement age of the “baby boom” children reinforces this phenomenon.
Switzerland is constantly adapting to this situation and responds by providing care in Retirement Homes, in Protected Living and at Home.
In the case of homecare organizations, one of the main challenges is that the patient should feel safe, well cared for, and be able to establish real contact with the caregivers. Caregivers are intimate and the client needs to feel comfortable.
For their part, homecare organizations are subject to various constraints, including regulatory and budgetary constraints. In addition, the lack of staff becomes a real issue.
In this context, organizational innovation is a real way to meet these challenges.
Caregivers must be able to enjoy greater autonomy in their work and decisions, administrative functions must be streamlined, and management processes must be optimized. One of the current approaches, implemented by several organizations in Switzerland, is the implementation of micro-teams, inspired by the Buurtzorg model for nursing care in the Netherlands.
However, the multidisciplinary aspect of personal household services in Switzerland makes this approach more complex, and organizations need to think carefully about these types of models before implementing them.
Solution
Implementation of a new organizational model, with the goal that each client is cared for by a small team of a dozen caregivers, providing both care and assistance and support.
Within the micro-teams, each nurse is responsible for about twenty clients for whom she acts as a referent. Responsibility for care is shifted from team leaders in the centers to nurses in the field, in contact with patients.
This avoids staff turnover, as patients feel closer to the caregivers.
Cela évite les rotations de personnel auprès des patients qui ainsi se sentent plus proches des intervenants. Ce rapprochement facilite le dialogue, les patients se sentent en sécurité et perçoivent une réelle qualité dans la relation avec les soignants.
Ces micro-équipes jouissent d’une grande autonomie, elles sont responsables de la prise en charge, de l’organisation des soins, de la planification des visites et des objectifs de soins établis avec les patients.
Les centres agissent comme des entités de support et de coaching, le temps du mangement purement hiérarchique est révolu en faveur d’une autonomie du personnel de soins.
Impact
The implementation of an innovative organizational model presupposes a strong involvement of the general management and the unfailing support of sponsors and/or authorities.
The response to this challenge also involves overhauling the information system, which must respond in a relevant and reliable manner to this decentralization of activities.
With its 100% Web-based health platform, MLS was able to support this new organization in less than six months. The reassignment of functions responding to the new processes put in place was implemented in record time.
In a first step, during workshops conducted with project sponsors and leaders, MLS was able to understand the new business processes and adapt its application. This made it possible to respond to this decentralization by bringing maximum ease of use to the different actors, while maintaining a constant exchange of information in complete security.
The implementation of an innovative organization requires that the information system be a real support for users and that its adaptation can be carried out without delaying the organizational change.
MLS has risen to this challenge and is able to offer all home care organizations the opportunity to switch from one organizational model to another in complete security, in record time and at a reasonable cost.
Change management, which should not be underestimated, is also facilitated by the fact that staff continue to work in the same application but with rights and access to functionalities that correspond to their mission.
