Resource:

The Influence of Employee Satisfaction on Patient Satisfaction and Safety

Whitepaper

Content provided by AHA Endorsement partner: Halogen Software

This whitepaper builds the case for automated talent management in health care

Intuitively, it is easy to link patient safety and patient satisfaction to employee satisfaction. A happy employee is focused on their professional tasks, without being distracted by a negative environment, which leads to better performance. Statistically valid research is turning this intuition into fact. For example, The Georgia Quality Initiative, which began in 2003, has identified that Long Term Care (LTC) facilities with happy employees have fewer patient falls, and fewer residents with acquired pressure ulcers and acquired catheters.1 There is also statistically valid evidence that shows a strong relationship between patient satisfaction and employee satisfaction.2

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) already have initiatives underway that use performance-based financial incentives and public reporting of quality information to encourage improvements in all aspects of quality, including patient safety.3 In fact, CMS’s Innovators’ Guide to Navigating CMS (August 25th 2008) states “CMS intends to develop a hospital VBP (value-based purchasing) measure set that comprehensively addresses clinical quality, patient safety, patient experience, and resource use.”

Since patient safety and patient experience are heavily influenced by employee attitudes and satisfaction, an unhappy workforce can have significant financial consequences on payments from Medicare and Medicaid, the two largest payment systems.

Download the whitepaper to learn five key drivers of employee satisfaction.

SOURCES:

  1. The Critical Link Between Workforce & Organizational Excellence (My InnerView Inc. 2007); Dr. Leslie Grant, Associate Professor of Healthcare Management in the Division of Health Policy Management and Director of the Center for Aging Services Management at the University of Minnesota.
  2. 2007 National Survey of Consumer and Workforce Satisfaction in Nursing Homes. Members of My InnerView’s Research Team– Leslie Grant, Ph.D., Michael Davern, Ph.D., Brad Shiverick, C.P.H.Q., V. Tellis-Nayak, PH.D., Amy Hu, M.S., and Eric Lewerenz, M.S Hospital Check-up Report 2007 Nurse and Employee Perspectives on American Healthcare; Press Ganey Associates, Inc. Faculty.
  3. Innovators’ Guide to Navigating CMS; Version 1.0, August 25, 2008 p.52; Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services