Honolulu: a great place to vacation. So much sunshine boosts your mood and mental health. On top of that, the sun also benefits bone health, the immune system, and the quality of sleep. However, Hawaii faces serious healthcare issues. Honolulu’s healthcare facilities are doing their best, but nurse staffing is a challenge requiring flexible solutions.
Nursa: Your reliable healthcare staffing app in Honolulu, HI
To better understand the challenges to healthcare facilities, this article will look into three main questions:
- What are some unique points about health in Honolulu and Hawaii?
- What challenges do healthcare facilities face?
- How does Nursa help Honolulu facilities address the challenges?
Find out how Nursa, the most flexible staffing app in Honolulu, HI, can help you.
Health in Honolulu
Honolulu’s population has distinguishing characteristics that present particular healthcare needs. What is different about the population of Hawaii?
“The oldest of the old,” Hawaii has a higher percentage of seniors than other states.
The table below shows the population percentages of those over 65 and those over 85.
Hawaii is the state with the largest percentage of its population in the over 85-year-old group. Both the larger senior population and the cultural diversity place rising demands on healthcare services.
You might think that retirees move to Honolulu to enjoy the climate, culture, and beautiful beaches, and some do. However, the high cost of living makes it a less practical retirement destination than other warm states.
Life expectancy seems to be a more significant factor.
Hawaii, including Honolulu, has the highest life expectancy in the US: 80.7 years in Hawaii compared to 77 in the U.S. That’s almost a four-year difference.
An active lifestyle and dietary habits, combined with cultures that cherish community, family, and the elderly, all contribute to emotional well-being and longevity. Dietary staples in Honolulu include nearly twice as much fish as in mainland U.S. Fish is known to protect cardiovascular, mental, and cognitive health.
Besides longevity, another distinguishing characteristic of Honolulu's population is its cultural diversity.
Honolulu has several large and significant population groups of diverse descent, including native Hawaiian (Kānaka 'Ōiwi or Kānaka Maoli in the Hawaiian language), Chinese, Japanese, Philippine, Hispanics, and Europeans.
Much of the migration took place in the 19th century, and contributed to a multicultural society and a unique Hawaiian identity.
Although the Native Hawaiians are a minority—only eight percent—they continue to have a notable impact on the general culture. Aloha is a widely used greeting embodying what is often called the Aloha Spirit, with compassion, love, respect, and harmony. Even in mainland US, who hasn’t heard of the greeting “Aloha”?
Challenges to healthcare facilities and solutions
What are some of the challenges facing healthcare facilities due to longevity and diversity?
The healthcare needs of seniors impact staffing in both hospitals and long-term care facilities. Let’s take a look at the challenges involved.
Increasing demand for geriatric care
Senior citizens, especially those over 85, have high disability rates and often need both acute and post-acute care, intensifying the nursing shortage. Hawaii tops the chart for life expectancy, and the strain on facilities is increasingly evident.
Cultural challenges
Patients come with a variety of ancestral beliefs and practices related to health, illness, and treatment.
Culturally competent healthcare professionals who appreciate and understand these diverse beliefs can enhance healthcare in many ways:
- Integration of relevant cultural practices into their care plans, when possible, can heighten patient engagement and improve outcomes.
- Trust and rapport support the patient’s commitment to follow-up.
- Recognizing occasional language barriers and ensuring understanding also increases positive healthcare outcomes.
Among the different cultural groups significant health disparities exist, particularly affecting Native Hawaiians. These populations suffer due to barriers to accessing quality healthcare, such as a lack of financial resources and historical mistrust and trauma.
However, Nursa, with its vast pool of local nurses, may connect you with some who reflect the diversity in Honolulu and have a head start on connecting with patients from the same cultural background.
Financial limitations
Healthcare facilities in Honolulu struggle with a combination of the high cost of living and low Medicare and MedQuest (Medicaid) reimbursements, workforce shortages, and a general sales tax. Hawaii is one of only four states that apply a sales tax to medical services, the General Excise Tax. This makes economy and efficiency a serious priority.
New regulations for nursing homes
In April 2024, CMS issued national staffing regulations for long-term residential care facilities, establishing staffing ratios and mandating a registered nurse (RN) on site 24/7.
In the same year, the Hawaii Department of Health established an even higher standard for RN staffing in nursing homes, requiring one RN for every 15 residents during the day and one RN for every 30 residents at night. For most facilities, these standards call for more nursing personnel, raising costs.
Actively addressing these challenges, Hawaii has achieved an impressive insurance coverage rate of almost 96 percent of its population. The state designed the MedQuest program to address many of the state's unique healthcare challenges.
Some of its key aspects are:
- Managed Care Organizations (MCOs) that receive capitation fees from the state to provide comprehensive care to Medicaid beneficiaries
- Fees-for-service coverage with out-of-network providers
- Integration of a wider range of people as beneficiaries
- Community-based care
- Training in cultural competence
- Preventive care and wellness programs
- Workforce development
Nursa also helps healthcare facilities meet staffing ratios and manage financial issues. With per diem flexible staffing solutions, the app provides access to local nursing clinicians looking to pick up shifts.
How can Nursa help you?
Nursa helps you save time and money, putting you in contact with the lowest-cost, reliable PRN nurses in Honolulu, HI. On top of that, Nursa has technology that lightens your administrative burden.
How does Nursa save time?
Nursa streamlines the healthcare staffing process with automation as an advantage. No more phone calls to cover shifts. The Nursa platform allows you to:
- Post vacant shifts and wait for vetted applicants to request to work the shifts.
- Compile a Favorites List of PRN nurses who have worked for you and won your trust and confidence. Turn on Auto-Schedule so these nurses are automatically scheduled for shifts when they apply. You can modify the list at any time.
- Create customizable compliance checklists to make sure that the candidates comply with regulations and facility requirements.
So, save time while you save lives with efficient and reliable hospital or nursing home staffing.
How does Nursa save you money?
With on-demand or contingent PRN staffing, Nursa helps you save money directly and indirectly. Here are a few of Nursa’s cost-effective features:
- Flexible scheduling: Per diem nursing allows you to cover your staffing needs in peak times and avoid the cost of overstaffing in times of low patient census.
- Reducing burnout and turnover: With PRN nurses, you can meet emergency staffing needs without asking staff nurses to work overtime. Overworking your internal staff can lead to burnout and turnover.
- Direct communication: Nursa connects facilities directly with nurses and eliminates some typical agency fees. Nursa is not a nurse staffing agency in Honolulu, HI. It is an open healthcare platform.
- Transparency: Facilities set the rates for each shift, and there are no hidden fees or surprise costs. This supports budget management and financial planning.
- Local expertise: Local healthcare professionals will request to work your posted shifts, and you avoid the high cost of contracting travel nurses.
How does Nursa alleviate your administrative tasks?
All of these practical advantages contribute to higher quality patient care, supported by a healthy nurse-patient ratio, and the lowest-cost reliable nurses.
- Credential verification: Nursa verifies credentials before allowing a nurse to apply for a shift.
- Background checks: Nursa also runs background checks for all nurses on the platform before they can apply.
- Real-Time Data: Facilities have access to real-time rating systems and quality metrics, ensuring accountability and transparency and providing insights into medical staffing costs and utilization.
If you have any questions you can contact Nursa Support by telephone, email, or live chat.
Register with Nursa today and get started
Nursa serves hospitals, long-term residential care centers, and other healthcare organizations that need reliable, low-cost staff. These steps will get you on your way.
- Download Nursa and connect your facility.
- We will contact you to verify your information.
- Curate a compliance list.
- Post vacant shifts.
- Review the applicants and schedule the nurses that fit the shifts.
Nursa is the most flexible PRN healthcare staffing company in Honolulu, HI. Let us take some stress out of nurse staffing for you. Sign up with Nursa today.
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