This week’s “Ftag of Week” on the CMSCG Blog is going to be a revisit to F730 Nurse Aide Perform Review – 12Hr/Year In‐ service, which was originally reviewed seven years ago in January 2018. I am sure that you are asking yourself, “why go back to this unimportant tag?” It is not so unimportant if you take a few minutes to re-read Brandie’s original Ftag of the Week from January 19, 2018. A revisit is warranted in my mind as nursing homes appear to have gotten lost in the weeds as to the importance of inservice training and how this education ties into a Nurse Aide’s annual Performance Evaluation.
The essence of this regulation has not changed and is clearly defined in State Operations Manual Appendix PP under intent.
“INTENT – To focus on the performance review requirement and specific in-service education based on the outcome of those reviews for each individual nurse aide.”
However, this intent does not appear to be met during review of employee education and performance review records that are sampled during a CMSCG mock survey. Attention needs to be given to this tag as surveyors are giving greater scrutiny to everything related to Nursing Services during the survey process, including F725 Sufficient Nursing Staff and F726 Competent Nursing Staff. We also know that there are way too many citations of F677 ADL Care Provided for Dependent Residents. Who is providing this ADL care? Nursing Aides, of course. So, it is our responsibility to ensure that our obligation to provide the required twelve hours of education annually for each Nurse Aide who works in our organization whether it is full-time, part-time or per diem is met.
The quality and type of education provided is important – yes, it is important for a Nurse Aide to understand your EMR system, but is counting two hours for learning how to send an email or reviewing the facility’s cell phone policy really improving an aide’s job performance in caring for your resident population? I have even seen education hours counted for learning how to do your banking online. This is a great personal knowledge program offering to your staff, but is it helping an aide complete their duties and responsibilities?
I recommend a comprehensive review of the quantity and topics/educational offerings for Nurse Aides that you currently have in place. Education reviews frequently lack evidence of education regarding trauma-informed care, behavior health, care of a resident with dementia, use of mechanical lifts, pressure injury prevention for the aide or customer service.
These are just examples of topics that don’t get covered and should be – some of them are required training. Refer to F947 for specific requirements. Don’t forget your responsibility to ensure that the aide participates in these required hours – your facility attests to this requirement being met when you submit the paperwork for their recertification.
So how does this education tie into a performance evaluation? It goes right to our responsibility for developing an “honest” Performance Evaluation that accurately reflects the aide’s job performance as well as area/s that would benefit from an individualized PIP. It is easy for an evaluator to document that an aide meets or excels all standards and is a “great team player,” but it is much more time-consuming for the evaluator to actually consider how an aide is completing all his/her job duties as outlined in your facility’s performance evaluation document. There needs to be a “link” between an aide’s annual performance review and the in-service training they receive. A last thought – are any of us so stellar that there is nothing in our job performance that would benefit from a little performance improvement other than time and attendance?
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