Yep, that cherry turnover might have caught your attention, but with turnover averaging 45% or more, for Direct Support Professionals (DSP) at Home and Community Based Service providers, the word turnover is more likely to turn your stomach than tickle your taste buds.
You know all the reasons, poverty level hourly rates for DSPs, full employment providing other options, hard and challenging work, a need for compassion, all lead to high levels of turnover.
Our customers have found that implementing the MedSupport eMAR app with its intuitive paperless point-of-care prompting system can reduce turnover related to med errors, and especially for younger staff, used to working with mobile phones, reduce stress and improve work satisfaction over filling out paper reports.
Furthermore, as we all now rely on social media, giving care based on inanimate paper, amplifies the loneliness and riskiness of being out in the community away from mentors and medical staff who can provide guidance and direction in both day-to-day functions and crises. MedSupport becomes an active electronic lifeline to those resources, again reducing stress that can lead to turnover.
Finally, if you do experience turnover, onboarding with an electronic paperless point-of-care system and eMAR is easier. For DSPs it’s like being trained on a secure social media app that generates all the necessary paperwork. It’s all there right at your fingertips, not spread across umpteen bits of paper buried in binders or folders. So, as a DSP, you are up and running quickly with those electronic lifelines, including our CaraSolva Technical support team, there to guide and encourage you.
We are out in the community in those homes, and see how challenging it is to be a DSP. We see the compassion, patience, and knowledge needed to do the job well and we give DSPs great respect. The most impactful answer to slowing turnover is to increase reimbursement rates to pay a fair and competitive wage. In the mean time, we will continue to work with DSPs and their management to further enhance MedSupport to reduce the stress on the DSP, to allow them to focus on the care and well being of the individuals they are supporting. It’s our passion!