Barriers and facilitators to adopting nursing home culture change

Objective: To review the nursing home culture change literature and identify common barriers to and facilitators of nursing home culture change adoption. Nursing home culture change aims to make nursing homes less institutional by providing more resident-centered care, making environments more homelike, and empowering direct care staff.
•Methods: We reviewed the research literature on nursing home culture change, especially as related to implementation and outcomes. •
•Results: Adoption of nursing home culture change practices has been steadily increasing in the past decade, but some practices are more likely to be adopted than others. A commonly reported barrier to culture change adoption is staff resistance to change. Studies suggest that this resistance can be overcome by changes to management practices, including good communication, providing training and education, and leadership support.
•Conclusion: The numerous benefits of nursing home culture change are apparent in the literature. Barriers to its adoption may be overcome by making improvements to nursing home management practices.