Living in a nursing home can be isolating, particularly for older adults with behavioral health needs and not a lot of local support outside staff at the facility. When program manager Stephanie Majka, LCSW, LAC, walks through the doors of Parkview Care Center, she greets everyone she sees with a huge smile and a friendly, “Hello!” She’s loaded up with a backpack, shoulder bag and her own rolling folding chair, ready to meet with people served by WellPower’s Nursing Home Liaison program.
WellPower’s Nursing Home Liaison program coordinates with long-term care homes throughout Denver to provide on-site mental and behavioral health services to residents served by WellPower, as well as coordinating with other providers and wraparound care offered by other WellPower programs.
Majka and her team of six clinicians walk the walk when it comes to meeting people where they are, in every sense of the phrase. They have a caseload of nearly 250 people across 14 long-term care facilities in the metro Denver area.
What does a day in the life of a nursing home liaison clinician look like? We met up with Stephanie to find out.
A Day in the Life
Majka begins her day before 8 a.m. checking up on what has happened overnight for the people on her caseload, reaching out to hospitals if someone has been admitted and coordinating meetings and logistics for the day.
When we arrive at Parkview Care Center at 10 a.m., Majka is already preparing to start on her usual appointments. From the second she walks in, she greets the nursing staff stops to chat with a resident sitting in a wheelchair in the hallway and helps another resident find their care provider, all before setting down her bags in a conference room.
Setting up a makeshift office and prepping for her time at Parkview, she plans to visit the residents with appointments first, then walk around the building to find any others who might be having a tough day.
“Part of my job is physically being here and present with the people we serve – literally going to their spaces and meeting with them in person,” says Majka. “It offers me the ability to see how they’re interacting with their environments, with the people around them, how their living space is functioning for them and to provide them with an advocate if things aren’t going well.”
She also stops in to speak with the social worker or other staff member that can give her updates on how residents are doing and if they have anyone that they would like her to see urgently.
Service with a Smile
For so many people living in nursing homes, sometimes just eye contact and a cheerful “Good morning!” are enough to brighten their days. Majka knows this and makes a point to greet everyone she sees.
“I think what a lot of people don’t get, or struggle with conceptualizing, is that living in a nursing home can be HARD,” Majka says. “It is often so mentally and emotionally taxing to live in a space where you require round-the-clock care, and that weighs on people.” These are adults who strive for the same level of dignity and respect that we all deserve as humans, and because of their medical diagnoses, behavioral health needs or both, they require 24/7 care instead of living independently.
“That’s really tough for a lot of them,” she adds.
Majka and her team regularly provide a breadth of behavioral health services for the people they serve, including:
- Therapy
- Case management
- Psychiatric evaluations and medications
- Coordination for monthly medical visits with WellPower
- Group therapy
- Educating care home staff about trauma-informed practices
- Care conferences for people served
- Crisis services
Additionally, she and her team are responsible for documenting all visits with people served, keeping up with notes, providing coordination support for other providers and care teams and so much more.
“It’s a lot,” she says, grinning. “But it’s a lot in the way that you end each day knowing you made a difference in someone’s life for the better. It’s good work, even when it’s hard work.”
Meet Scott and Dane
Majka regularly meets with Scott and Dane, residents at Parkview, when she visits. As people who have been served by WellPower for many years, they understand the unique service she and her team provide.
Dane, whom Majka sees weekly for therapy sessions, welcomes us into her room to chat about their experience with the program.
“I’ve been seeing people from WellPower for my mental health needs for a long time,” says Dane. WellPower helped Dane with independent living, counseling, case management and getting set up with telehealth when the pandemic hit. “Stephanie has been a lifeline for me here,” says Dane. “She gives me space to talk about mental health issues, things that happened to me in my past, as well as practical issues about living in a nursing home. She has been a tremendous help to me, and she doesn’t try to shut down my emotions.”
When Scott joins us in the conference-room-turned-temporary-office, he offers insight into his experience living and receiving services at Parkview for several years.
“I’ve been with WellPower for many years and have used a bunch of services, like living in the residential homes, getting psychiatric care, therapy and NextChapter,” says Scott. “Having someone like Stephanie to talk to every week really helps me to feel taken care of. Living at Parkview means that my physical needs for my diabetes, medications and physical therapy are all handled by the staff here, who are great, but there’s something really necessary about a person who’s just there to listen to you.”
Scott emphasizes that he has Medicaid coverage and is an Army veteran. “I’ve had a lot to deal with from that part of my history and I need the care Medicaid offers to keep getting the services I have here,” he says. “There are people out there – veterans like me – who have really complicated needs, both physical and mental. Folks like Stephanie and her team are such a huge help, but I could never afford the care I get from them and the staff here at Parkview if I didn’t have Medicaid.”
Small Team, Big Impact
For a team of seven (and hoping to hire an eighth), Majka’s nursing home liaison program makes a huge difference in the Denver community. She and her team usually spend their afternoons visiting other people served in the 14 care homes contracted with WellPower across Denver, but when they aren’t in sessions or on-site, their plates are far from empty.
Majka explains that any time they aren’t visiting with a person we serve, they are doing administrative documentation, coordinating care via email and phone call and collaborating and connecting assistance for all the wrap-around services WellPower provides.
“People know when you’re being genuine with them,” she says. “It’s hard working in a nursing home and it’s hard living in a nursing home. I love this work, I love being able to just chat with people, smile at them and say good morning. It makes such a big difference for me to know that the work I do impacts people’s lives for the better.”
Do You Know Someone Who Could Use This Program?
If you or someone you love could benefit from WellPower’s Nursing Home Liaison program, or you’re part of a nursing home that would like to work with WellPower, you can get in touch with Stephanie directly at stephanie.majka@wellpower.org to discuss options or availability.
For all other behavioral health services with WellPower, we invite you to visit us at wellpower.org/access or give us a call at (303) 504-7900 to get started.