Article Reviews – Understanding Consumer Preferences in Nursing Homes

Article Reviews – Understanding Consumer Preferences in Nursing Homes

Introduction

The nursing home business is fast becoming a needed service rather than an option. Families unable to care for their elderly loved ones because of diverse reasons are seeking to put them up in homes that can care for them. Getting a nursing home that fits a consumer’s expectations is not only difficult but challenging as well. There are several marketing guides that advertise the services that various nursing homes offer. The gap that exists, however, is what exactly consumers look for when searching for a nursing home. To further query into the situation, nursing homes are known to offer substandard services that jeopardize the lives of the consumer as well as risk the licenses of staff working in the homes. That said, there needs to be a bridge that links the consumer needs with the service provided. When service providers are aware of what consumers are looking for, they will be better placed to offer the said services at competitive prices. Additionally, when service providers provide optimal care to the elderly, they will increase demand for their services, which will, in turn, call for an increase in staffing of the facilities and consequentially enhance staff and customer satisfaction. This research paper investigates what consumers seek when looking to contract the services of a nursing home. That said, there are several pieces of research that have touched on the same. This review will assess three such articles to form a basis for the final research paper.

Article Reviews

The first article is one by Helefe et al. (2016), whose research sought to identify what consumers know regarding nursing homes prior to making a choice on which service to contract. The research also sought to determine if the information preference varied across ethnicity/race. The researchers collected information from the Greater Boston area between the months of January 2013 and February 2014. The participants included adults aged 40 to 64 years and those who were more than 65 years old and living in communities. The participants were selected from the Latino, Black, and White communities who had familial or personal experience with admission in a nursing home or those who had concerns regarding nursing homes.  The study design involved eleven focus groups. Interviews were conducted in categories of age and ethnicity. A total of 30 interviews were done. The findings of the research revealed that the participants stated that they wanted sufficient information on residents, staff, policies, and the facility and, more specifically, on resident conditions, how the staff treated residents and the location of the nursing homes. They also wanted reviews from residents or their families as well as a sense of gestalt of the nursing homes. Additionally, the nursing home’s cultural sensitivity and staff ethnic concordance were of importance to Latino and Black participants. Lastly, Latino participants expressed their need to know the staff concordance with reference to language. The research concluded that the current Nursing Home Compare website and similar sites need to incorporate additional information on their websites that covers what consumers deem to be relevant and important. The results of the research can also be added by nursing home managers to their respective websites, such as adding information on cultural diversity and security policies, among others.  The research’s limitations were its lack of generalizability, as it was restricted to the Boston area.

The second article is by Milte et al. (2017), who analyzed the characteristics of nursing homes that consumers value the most. The research aimed at generating a scoring algorithm that was weighted on consumer preference for nursing home quality care assessment in six main areas. Participants were recruited from nursing homes in Australia (17 homes) from both rural and metropolitan areas. For those that had severe cognitive impairment, family members were recruited in their stead.  The CCI-6D instruments were used to measure the 6 dimensions. The Discrete Choice Experiment was also used to elicit CCI-6D values. Data analysis was done using mixed and conditional logit regression models to determine the potential attribute preferences. The results of the study indicated that all the attributes were of significance to the participants. The important characteristic identified by residents and members of the family was residents feeling at home in their own rooms. Other characteristics included the ability of care staff to spend considerable time with residents, the feeling of being at home in shared spaces, and the flexibility of staff in their routines. The null hypothesis was rejected by the Swait Louviere test, where the hypothesis estimated similarity in parameters between residents and family members. This indicated that pooling data from the two categories of participants was not possible to generate one Consumer Choice weighted scoring in the CCI-6D instrument. Hence, it was clear that residents and family members had different perceptions of what is of significance when it comes to assessing the desirability of a nursing home. Managers in nursing homes can use the CCI-6D instrument in evaluating, planning, and designing their services. The main limitation of the study was in the use of the CCI-6D instrument levels, such as ‘rarely’ and ‘sometimes,’ which are open to individual interpretation. The authors also noted the possibility of bias in participant reporting.

The third article is by Kellogg et al. (2018), which analyzed what consumers say in online reviews with regard to nursing homes.  The researchers analyzed the Yelp reviews on nursing homes in California (51 in total). The selected nursing homes represented a range of occupancy rates and geographical areas. Grounded theory was used to identify codes and track the frequency with which each code was mentioned. 24 codes were identified from 264 reviews which were categorized into 5 groups. These categories were staffing and staff care quality, setting and physical facility, security and safety of residents, quality of clinical care, and financial issues. 29.2% of reviews were on staff responsiveness, while 53.41% were on caring and attitudes of staff. Some of the reviews also focused on the physical environment of nursing homes. Less frequently mentioned were the security and safety of residents and the healthcare quality provided in the nursing home.  The study was of significance because the Nursing Home Compare website does not report on physical settings and staff attitudes but rather on clinical outcomes and processes as well as staffing levels. The authors recommended that both rating system types be included to provide more comprehensive information. The main limitation of the study was its qualitative nature, which made it difficult to test results for statistical significance. The generalizability of the research was also inhibited by the small size of the sample and the inclusion of nursing homes from within California only.

In conclusion, the three articles highlight the need to assess the expectations of nursing home consumers. When consumers are given the opportunity to openly discuss what they dislike and like about nursing homes, the information can be used by managers to improve service delivery. As regards the Nursing Home Compare website, the information from consumers can be incorporated to aid in ease of comparability when selecting an ideal nursing home. The current research will be more comprehensive, cover a wider niche of participants, and include either focus discussions or interviews along with online participation to get comprehensive information on what nursing home consumers expect in terms of service provision from nursing homes.

References

Hefele, J. G., Acevedo, A., Nsiah-Jefferson, L., Bishop, C., Abbas, Y., Damien, E., & Ramos, C. (2016). Choosing a Nursing Home: What Do Consumers Want to Know, and Do Preferences Vary across Race/Ethnicity? Health services research, 51 Suppl 2(Suppl 2), 1167–1187. https://doi.org/10.1111/1475-6773.12457

Kellogg, C., Zhu, Y., Cardenas, V., Vazquez, K., Johari, K., Rahman, A., & Enguidanos, S. (2018). What consumers say about nursing homes in online reviews. The Gerontologist, 58(4), e273-e280.

Milte, R., Ratcliffe, J., Chen, G., & Crotty, M. (2018). What characteristics of nursing homes are most valued by consumers? A discrete choice experiment with residents and family members. Value in Health, 21(7), 843-849.

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Understanding Consumer Preferences in Nursing Homes

‘What do consumers look for in selecting a nursing home for their elderly loved ones?’

• Select at least three articles (academic research papers or professional sources for business/project plans) to review and analyze that relate to the research proposal or business idea you are working on. Note: These should be chosen so that they can become a part of your actual literature review/market analysis for your final project.
• For a research paper:
  Your review should take into consideration (as applicable):
• Core Theory (theory areas) from Literature
• Reason or Justification for Research (why important)
• Targeted Audience (who will use this information)
• Area of Application in Business
• Research Question (the problem to be solved)
• Research Methodology and Design Used
• Taxonomy (models, names) Used
• Quantitative Tools Used
• Limitations
• Analysis and Recommendations
• Recommendations for Further Study
• Charts and/or Tables Used
• Christian Principles Present (with intent or not)
• Is the article understandable to a manager or executive? Why or why not?
• Is the article practical and/or helpful for management decision-making? How?
• For a business plan (U.S. Small Business Administration, n.d.):
• • Industry Description
  • Who Is (Would be) Your Target Market
  • • Distinguishing Characteristics
    • Size of Market
    • Predicted Growth
    • Predicted Market Share of Your Business
    • Pricing and Gross Margin Targets
  • Competitive Analysis
  • • Market Share of Competitors
    • Strengths, Weaknesses and Potential Barriers to Entry
  • Regulatory Restrictions or Requirements (accreditations, laws, or compliance issues)

Your paper should be 3-5 pages long, not including cover and reference pages, and be formatted according to APA guidelines. Submit your analysis paper using the Session 2 Project Assignment.

Reference

U.S. Small Business Administration. (n.d.). Create your business plan: Starting & managing. Retrieved from https://www.sba.gov/starting-business/write-your-business-plan/market-analysis