The vision for this blog is to create a community of harmonious professionals across the care continuum who encourage each other in exploring digital media as a way to support businesses and families dealing with elder care.
Written on February 28th, 2012 by tasha
Sometimes it helps to go back to basics. I’m preparing to give a webinar about marketing and website development for the Building a GCM Business series of the National Association for Professional Geriatric Care Managers. Although my thoughts are currently looking at geriatric care managers and the private pay market, you will see that these basics apply for hospice and home health as well.
When I first took marketing classes, the standard was “The 4 P’s”: Product, Place, Price and Promotion. While these are still relevant, they are more geared to manufacturing and selling products than they are to marketing a service.
A newer version has been evolving called the 4 C’s. I’ve seen several permutations, but the four that strike me as most relevant for elder care providers are:
And to this, I would add
Written on February 14th, 2012 by tasha
In a departure from my usual topics, this blogpost will be personal. I was honored yesterday to be present at the passing of my stepmother. She had broken her hip and contracted pneumonia after the surgery. Having slid behind the veil of dementia several years ago, this physical set back was more than her body could withstand. She seemed to rally at first, but then declined rapidly. Rather than keep her alive with machines, yesterday we let her go.
In spending a last visit with her, I took my cues from my training as a hospice volunteer. A favorite author, Dr. Ira Byock, has suggested that closure of a relationship involves these simple phrases:
With her dementia, the forgiveness piece was best handled non-verbally, by beaming our love and acceptance through our eyes. My brother, half-sister and I had long ago made our peace with the usual bumps and bruises that happen in family life.
For Christopher and me, our stepmother was our mom for a quarter of the year when we spent summers with our dad. She was a fun-loving counterpart to our very intellectual parents. She brought music and silliness and an earthy charm that had her making mud pies with us out in the backyard. She taught me to play the piano as a child, and bought me my first radio as a teenager. She became known to my son, very affectionately, as “Grandma Quack” because she spent an afternoon on a boat with him as a toddler, teaching him to talk to the ducklings swimming by.
Laura’s last hours were filled with stories of appreciation, with tender caresses to her head, and her hands held by one child or another. We said our thank yous, expressed our love, and then said good-bye as they removed her life support. It was a sweet and peaceful passing.
I am grateful for the structure of Dr. Byock’s simple formula. It helped my siblings and I to create closure and give my stepmom the send-off she deserved. They are simple words, but very big concepts. If you haven’t taught your volunteers and staff this approach, I highly recommend it.
Written on January 31st, 2012 by tasha
In our on-going series on social media policies, I’m turning my attention to a policy for handling negative comments. This seems to be the number one fear, after HIPAA, that I hear from leadership. If you have a policy in place, it will help everyone to feel more prepared should someone say something disparaging about your business.
Let’s start with a few acknowledgements:
What are the comments you can/should just delete?
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Written on January 17th, 2012 by tasha
I am continuing my series on social media policies. The last post was on intellectual property laws and thoughts on how to guide your employees so they don’t inadvertently trigger a copyright infringement suit. The social media policy post before that looked mostly at HIPAA and employee social media policies you need to have even if you aren’t publishing on Facebook, Twitter or a blog.
For this entry, we’re going to look at defamation, libel and false light. To be honest, when I started researching this, I didn’t think it was much of an issue for elder care professionals.
Hmmm.
And even if you don’t define yourself as an advocate (not that you should), the weird thing about the Internet is that even one obscure little blogpost could end up being seen by millions. Double hmmm. That puts the stakes a little higher than your average brochure or flyer and makes it wise to understand how to say what you need to say AND protect yourself.
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Written on January 3rd, 2012 by tasha
In a previous post, we wrote about Social Media Policies even if you don’t do social media. While your business may not be involved in social networking, odds are, your employees are engaging in Facebook or Twitter, YouTube or writing a blog.
You need to be sure they do not violate HIPAA nor say things even in their personal posts that reflect poorly on your company.
In the next few blog entries, I am turning my attention to the legal risks of publishing online. After HIPAA, I would say the next most likely transgression has to do with intellectual property violations.
Intellectual property rights apply to anything you publish (in print, or on your website, blog or Facebook page). Many companies, rightfully so, encourage employees to Like, Share and Comment on the company Facebook page or blog. And certainly your official “post-ers” are employees. In that light, be sure you are clear with everyone about what can and can’t be posted from a legal point of view. You don’t want a lawsuit!
