FLANH: Flanders Nursing Home workforce project

The quality of care in nursing homes (NHs) has been a long-standing concern. In addition, poor working conditions in NHs, such as high workload, high level of strain and low income, make recruitment and retention of qualified professionals difficult. Yet little is known about key organizational variables, such as staffing levels, skill mix, work environment variables and rationed or missed care, and their relationship with outcomes of residents and care workers in NHs. Therefore, the overall aim of the FLANH project is to develop a comprehensive and in-depth understanding of the interrelationships between key organizational variables and resident and care worker outcomes. FLANH will be a multicenter multi-methods research project including cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses based on survey and BelRAI registry data, mixed-methods analyses of care worker data and qualitative analyses of resident and informal caregiver data. As the first study in the Flemish NH context that will comprehensively study relations between key organizational factors and resident and care worker outcomes, FLANH will be a flag ship project that will support numerous stakeholders and policy makers to address NH needs in Flanders and will provide a benchmark for future intervention and quality improvement projects.

Keywords:staffing, rationing of care, resident outcomes, care worker outcomes, nursing homes, working environment

Disciplines:Geriatrics, Geriatric nursing, Residential health care