The Let's Get Comfy Podcast
Hosted by Founder and CEO of Comfort Measures Consulting LLC, Norman Harris. The Official Healthcare Edutainment station. Empowering listeners with the knowledge and resources to age comfortably. The podcast platform will uniquely provide laughter, peace, joy, resources and most of all COMFORT. Fostering professional partnerships and engaging the audience by providing them access to a REAL family-like conversation. That gives them the REAL reasons. Connects them to REAL reliable resources. To get REAL results. For REAL Comfort! Through interviews with C-suite healthcare leaders, experts, caregivers, founders, authors, educators, and thought leaders who are doing incredible work for older adults, family caregivers, and the healthcare community.
The Let's Get Comfy Podcast
Season Three Kickoff With Healthcare Lovebirds
Season three opens with heart, humor, and hard-won wisdom as we sit down with two leaders who live at the intersection of care and creativity: Robin Blyer of RB Health Partners and Dr. Walter Kittle, clinician-turned-international recording artist. We start with gratitude for the community that built this platform, then dig into what actually moves the needle in skilled nursing: culture, continuity, and practical systems that help people do their jobs well.
Robin shares how RB Health Partners built an interdisciplinary team—nursing, infection prevention, risk management, clinical reimbursement, life enrichment, and more—designed to strengthen facilities from the inside out. Her approach begins with listening, then layering regulatory review, trend analysis, and staff interviews to uncover root causes and culture patterns. We explore the cost of leadership turnover, the urgency of competency-based training for directors of nursing, and why a compliant grievance program can transform complaints into actionable data. The throughline is simple: sustained quality comes from shared accountability, clear tools, and support that respects the realities of frontline work.
Dr. Kittle’s journey brings a different lens on healing. After a severe back injury ended his clinical practice, he pivoted to music—carrying the same drive to help people into a new medium. We talk about the growing evidence around sound, frequency, and wellbeing, and hear a moving story of a guitarist with dementia who reconnected through his instrument. Music therapy, hospice experiences, and life enrichment all show how nonpharmacologic care can restore presence and dignity alongside medical treatment.
If you lead or support long-term care, this conversation offers a blueprint for change: invest in training, protect continuity, fix the grievance pipeline, and use expert voices openly. And if you’re here for the love story, you’ll get that too—tenacity, trust, and the balance of two careers that soar higher together. Enjoy the season kick-off, then share it with a colleague who needs a lift. Subscribe, leave a review, and tell us the one change you’d make at your facility today.
Thank you for tuning in for the Lexican Comfort Podcast. I'm your host, uh Norman Harris, uh owner and founder of Comfort Measures Consulting. I always say that there's no such thing as a self-made success story. So it's time for me to give a special uh thank you to many uh individuals that helped me get to this point. All right. First off, I want to thank all the previous guests that's been on season one, two, and three uh for taking time out of their busy schedules to come here uh in person to shoot their episode and share their story to the community. Thank you so much for ever grateful. I have to thank my wife uh and Dr. Judy Johnson. Dr. Judy Johnson uh share her location. Uh for me to shoot season one, two, and three. So I really appreciate her seeing the vision. My wife was my producer. Uh my kids, many of the guests that came on the show, they actually met my family because that's how I started this journey uh with them, and they'll still be a part of the journey. So thank you so much to my baby Quishandra uh Harris, uh Dr. Quishandra Harris, uh for uh giving me an opportunity to chase this vision. I thank you to Corey Crawford for being my right hand. If you need any assistance with branding, social media, graphic design, website creation, OTV Agency is the place to go to. Special thank you to all the organizations that uh open the doors and arms to Comfort Measures Consulting and the Let's Get Comfort Podcast. Uh my goal is to bring healthcare to the forefront in an edutainment fashion. That's why I proclaim Florida's number one healthcare entertainment station. A lot of things can be prevented if we have the conversation sooner, if we have the knowledge and actually apply it sooner. And that's what I'm all about with providing knowledge and resources in the healthcare space. Uh so thank you uh for uh Florida Healthcare to FAMDA, uh to Fedonna. Uh those organizations really allow our blogcasting service to highlight wonderful physicians and medical directors that are doing great work and director of nursing who have incredibly hard and tiresome jobs right every single day. I I come here today just sharing from the bottom of my heart a special thank you to each and every one of you. Uh to Jennifer Eddings and the Call Light Collective, doing amazing on her platform at this time for also seeing the vision and saying, hey Norman, I'll give you an opportunity for me to share my story on Conference Measures Media. She's a part of the fabric, she's a part of the foundation. Um and I really and truly thank her. So I wanted to take time before we get started with season three and episode one, give a special thank you to each and every one of you. If you have not subscribed already, your subscription matters. Please subscribe on YouTube at Conference Measures Media. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, uh at Conference Measures Media or Conference Measures Consulting, I should say, or and or Conference Measures Consulting as well. Uh, thank you again for doing so in advance. Uh, please tune in to all past shows, all past videos as it truly is, uh knowledge and resources that could be very beneficial to you, or you can share it with someone you may know in need of help. It's another episode of the Let's Get Comfy Podcast. I'm your host, Norman Harris. Boy, I have some heavy hitters on the show. Season three is it's gonna be amazing. It's already starting out that way. Uh, two monumental uh individuals that's joining the platform. I'm so grateful for this opportunity um with CMC Media, the launch of CMC Media, but also the growth of the entire channel, the growth of our media and content. And today uh I want to give a special celebration uh to uh my two special guests. And they said, Norman, you have to have us together. We're funny together. So I say, you know what? It's gonna be my first show with two guests. So it's different for me as well. So uh I'm but I'm happy to.
SPEAKER_03:Maybe your last also.
SPEAKER_04:Oh no, no, you know, you may have other people that want to uh join in, join and want to do it, but at this, I think where you guys are gonna set the tone. Okay, set the tone. Sounds good. So welcome to the show, uh, Dr. Walter Kittle uh and the madam, Robin Blyer with RB Health Partners. Thank you so much for joining the show. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. So glad you joined us. Uh, and continuing the ritual here uh with season three. Uh, we always let our guests start them all in a little awkward situation. We let our guests introducing themselves. Uh, I always find most healthcare leaders feel don't feel too comfortable talking about themselves, but I want you all to do it today. Tell us who you are. We'll start with you.
SPEAKER_01:I'm Robin Blyer, and yeah, I own and operate RB Health Partners. This year will be 24 years in December. So I feel very fortunate to do that. I get to work with 39 other amazing people, and the secret sauce is them. So I'm very fortunate it's an interdisciplinary team. We are a national company, but we're probably the most prevalent in the southeastern part of the country, and we work it exclusively in long-term care, mostly skilled nursing facilities, some assisted living facilities, or continuing care retirement communities. So we try to help people be in regulatory compliance, look at their systems, processes, and then deal with things from clinical reimbursement to epidemiology to risk management, regulatory compliance, social services, uh activities, life enrichment, which is so important for the residents, um, and health information management, joint commission accreditation, and a few other things to try to help people do the best that they can do.
SPEAKER_04:You said that all without like having any interruptions or anything. We had to do about seven takes if I had to say all that.
SPEAKER_01:Well, I've been doing it for 24 years.
SPEAKER_04:Oh, gee. Thank you. That's amazing. But yes, welcome to the show once again. Thank you. You, sir?
SPEAKER_03:Well, you expect me to follow that. I know, right? I should have gone first. Oh, gee, well, I don't have much. Well, I'm Dr. Walter Kittle, and um I guess I've always uh been split on what I like to do. I I really love science, I really love music, and so I kind of go back and forth. So I actually started out as a music performance major in college on a full ride scholarship, and after a couple years, I figured out that I probably wouldn't get a job. So then I switched to biochemistry, then I became a got my doctorate in chiropractic and summa cum laude with highest honors. And then I did two additional years with a board certification in sports medicine and rehab. And then about uh how long is it about? How old am I? About 10 years ago, I retired, and of course, I went back into my first love, which is music, and now I'm an international recording artist with uh five songs on the top 100 in the nation, on the billboard charts, and uh starting to do festivals, and most of it's because of this person right here, because she backs me and supports me, and we're a great team.
SPEAKER_04:Yes, sir. Yes, sir. As I stated before, two monuments here uh with us today. So wonderful. Uh, you do you share with me just how you tuned all over the world uh with your music as well. And it's it's obvious that life actually connected you back with your passion, which was music. Uh so that's really good. But I want to talk about the love story. So we're gonna start off there. Little drama here, uh, but no. Uh so how did you pursue Ms. Blyr?
SPEAKER_03:Well, I was tenacious. I had to stick to it because she she's a hard person to date. There were stories about her actually leaving her dates at the restaurant and leaving them there on multiple occasions. Wow. We're both on this dating website. Just a couple times. We're on this dating website, and I hear all these stories. She would go out, didn't like them, she'd sneak out the back. Only twice. No, but now is that after if that you just oh wow. So I'm telling you, I went, I went through some vetting. I I tell you, she I just stuck to it. Um, she well, first of all, you you did a background check on me. Then she then she got my credit score from a friend where I bought a car. Whoa. Then she tricked me into taking this um personality profile, the dish thing. And uh, I'm lucky I survived. So I just I think the the secret was I just hung in there where all other people they quit, they couldn't take it. I just stood in there and I was very tenacious and they hung on, and finally she gave up.
SPEAKER_04:Wow.
SPEAKER_03:I was just exhausted. This is a lot of drama. Wow.
SPEAKER_04:So let me ask you this that like that research, uh, you do you get that from like a military background, like family, or you know, but no, but I'm a healthcare risk manager.
SPEAKER_03:Risk manager, she knows how to do this stuff. You did it too. I can't get away with anything.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, you say you don't even try. I don't even try, you're right. So uh in short, why Dr. Kittle?
SPEAKER_01:I think originally I found him interesting. He on his dating profile said he was the bass guitarist, which I believed him that he was. But then when we sat there and had some conversation, it I felt that there was probably a little more to that story. So I'm an investigator, I had to find that out.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, you investigated all right. Yeah, yeah, you did. It wasn't exactly the way he said. When did you actually tell him all of this? Like all the research that you did. Like, how did you discover that she did all of that research all you tricked me into it?
SPEAKER_03:I did not well, the the credit score I didn't find out till later. And the uh that you should have done first. I didn't find out till later, but she tricked me into doing the personality thing because I told her I was such a traditional individual and she says, No, you're not. I'm gonna prove it. Let's take this little test here. Wow, she probably did like a hair sample when you got a DNA, a DNA.
SPEAKER_01:You know, a girl can't not be too careful nowadays. Wow. I was divorced and single for a long time. Girl has to be careful.
SPEAKER_03:And actually, her friends, when we got married, they said, What did you do to her? Did you hypnotize her or drug her? She said she would never get married. What did you do to her? But you get it, Dr. K. I just stuck to it. Right. We'll call you. Wore down.
SPEAKER_04:I wore down. Yeah, you did. I mean, that's that mean you really saw something there, though, man. That's that's you went a difficult route, I'll say it. Sounds like it to me. It's been worth it. But it's been worth it. It's been worth it. There you go. It's been worth it. So one thing I I asked, I had to get permission to ask this question, uh, but I wanted to ask, I said, why not kiddle? Why didn't you go with Kittle? Oh, the last name? Yeah, I want to know that that decision.
SPEAKER_01:Because I own RB Health Partners. Okay. And I and RK Health Partners. There you go. You know how much money it costs to rebrand?
SPEAKER_03:Well, no, seriously.
SPEAKER_01:All the time to change all your credit cards and everything.
SPEAKER_03:Seriously, she has worked for many years to get her reputation. And I thought, no, I if we go with a different name, that's it. No, you work too hard for it. I said, it's not necessary.
SPEAKER_01:Socially, people call me kettle, but really okay.
SPEAKER_04:I like the understanding that you displayed uh for sure. Because you knew that she built something, you know, great, uh, and that she was on the verge of uh doing uh wonderful things. Because how many years again it's been?
SPEAKER_01:It's been 24 RB Health Partners 24 in December. We met in October of 2018.
SPEAKER_04:2018, 2018. Well, wonderful. Well, I want to I also want to start there uh because you guys joined the show to share your story and how you uh sort of met, uh, but and and just give that uh additional details about you two. But you also started out uh in healthcare as well. So if if you would tell us about your connection with uh Cairo Technology and what's all that what's that all about?
SPEAKER_03:Well, as I said, I always liked both science and music, and I always like to help people. And uh so I picked the field of chiropractic because you can really help people with that. And um I combined that with my science, so that actually the term chirotechnology is a uh term that I coined because back when dinosaurs roamed the earth when I was first in practice, there was a big divide in in physical medicine. There were the chiropractors that only did bone and joint, and then your PT people they only did muscle. And I'm going, it's both. So I actually came up with a system that dealt with both uh restore the joint movement, then get the musculature balanced. I was the first person in the state of Michigan to employ a massage therapist in my office because my thought was, well, if you have a tight muscle and I mobilize the joint and it's still tight, it's gonna pull it right back out of place. So I actually hired massage therapists and took a beating for it. I had colleagues actually turn me into the board, wanted to take away my license because I had a massage therapist. It was it was actually a fight. And now everybody has it, but at the time it was quite the thing. And then I also incorporated it into the central nervous system. So I I kind of I don't picture myself just as a chiropractor, I I picture myself as a healer, and I like to glean from all of the disciplines and put them together so that the the patient gets the best care.
SPEAKER_04:Yes, so you understand the value of manipulation too, of the ligaments as well, right? That's really good. And that's for thinking that you was the only one in the state at the time to bring that to the table. Yeah, but do you know why? Like they were, I guess, threatened by it at all? My personal feeling was they were jealous.
SPEAKER_02:They were jealous, but I don't know.
SPEAKER_04:That's good, man. So that's really good. So do you all consider yourselves entrepreneurs? Both of you. That question is for both. Yes.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, okay. I don't I don't think so, actually. I I consider I'm a humanitarian, actually. I I did I like to help people. So my impetus, what I wanted to do was help people. Now I did gain financially very well. In fact, at one time we had a uh company we were working with, and they said that after research, we were the one of the top five percent in the nation as far as uh you know uh services and money collected. But that wasn't my goal. My goal was to help people and say, if I helped you, tell your friend. Didn't advertise, lived in this little tiny town, and it was and then yet we were the top five percent in the nation. Wow. But I'm I'm kind of like what the Bible says, you give, it's given unto you. So that's my impetus. I don't really think of an entrepreneur though.
SPEAKER_04:I like it. That's a great response. Well, I will say, even to today, uh, one of the best ways to uh increase sales is word of mouth. Referral partners is always key. It really is.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, I I agree with that completely. I don't we, you know, we like to add our behave partners, we kind of originally voted on kind of like where we gave our monies. We don't do vendor tables, not that there's anything the matter with it, and thankfully many people do, but what we rather do is we make donations to the pack, we make donations to like the education building that was built at Florida Healthcare and other things of that nature, and you know, scholarship funds for nurse leadership. We uh sponsor the awards for uh, you know, nurse leadership for the CNA of the year, the LPN of the year, the RN of the year, all those um to try to encourage people to do more for their themselves. You know, the better they are, then the better their community is. So our kind of thing is we are entrepreneurial and army health partners, but we tithe a percentage of our earnings to help others.
SPEAKER_04:Help others, yes. So connecting that, uh, that's a very unique story that you guys kind of shared already. But uh, if you can share with uh me what is uh you say most unique about your marriage, but also how do you balance uh love and business as well? So that's a two-part question.
SPEAKER_03:Well, one thing that's unique is we both played the bassoon. Okay, and we both like anchovies on our pizza.
SPEAKER_01:Oh pizza often, not as much as we would like.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, but but I think what's unique is that we both have our own careers and we're both very dedicated to that, but we support each other's career and work together. It's not like a competition. It's it's it's what can I do to help you? What can I do to help you? It's it's just I think that's what's really unique. We're both could do well on our own, but we do better together. Better together. That's beautiful.
SPEAKER_01:I can't add to that. That's perfect. Good job, honey. Thank you.
SPEAKER_00:Hey friends, Jennifer Eddings here, the heart behind the Call Light Collective. You know, I created this space for you, I created this space for me, I created this space for all of us. This is a space that is designed for us to come in and speak about the things that are heavy for anyone that is navigating a difficult situation, for anyone that has found themselves standing in the middle of life just looking for the light. Around here, we talk about the things that aren't easy to talk about. We talk about the things that people typically are quiet about or whisper about. We talk about the things that literally can set someone free once they know that they're not the only one going through it. So this is my ask of you. I want you to be just as much of this movement as I am and the women that have sat in these chairs before you. I would love for you to share your story with me. Write to me, tell me what you're going through, share a situation that you've been navigating through and you just would love some outside perspective on. Or if you just really need to know that you're not alone, you can email me at ComeFromEasures24 at gmail.com. I would love to hear from you. Whenever you need something or you need someone to be there for you, I beg of you just to hit the call light. And I promise I'll answer. Because at the end of the day, all of us are just walking each other home one conversation at a time.
SPEAKER_04:All right. Uh RB Health Partners. Okay, so you created a wonderful uh organization, right? Uh if you can tell me the origins of RB Health Partner and what's one founding principle uh that you've kept since they won.
SPEAKER_01:Well, our principle is always about helping other people. So we think good care is productive and that's important. And obviously the good care doesn't just extend to the residents, although they're number one, but also the people that work there. So it's important that you know there's a culture of caring. And so we have that at our Be Health Partners, and we have long tenure. We have staff that have been with us for well, other than a few people that unfortunately passed away. Uh, we have people that have been with us, I think the longest is 16 years.
unknown:Wow.
SPEAKER_01:Um, but we have a lot of people that fall between, say, eight and 12 years. So tenure is one of the things that helps to monitor that. But I think it's great that um all our team, they're all different. They're, you know, they're each person is truly a unique different individual, but they all support each other. They're all caring of each other. Some are friends, some are not. Sometimes you make great friends at work, as you know, but not everybody does, andor not everyone's your friend in a group of 40. Obviously, that's everyone's not going to be everyone's friend, but everyone respects and admires. And then the other part of that is I try not to create. Competition. We don't have employee of the month or employee of the quarter. There's not a special award at the end of the year. There's no president's choice because honestly, we are all also better together, is our work theme at RB Health Partners. And if one person doesn't succeed, then we don't succeed. So at one meeting that I held one year, I bought um mirrors for everybody that came, you know, like a mirror that, like, you know, a gentleman might put in their bag or a lady might put in their purse. And I said, look at that mirror and look at yourself. Now look to your left and look to your right, because everybody is everybody. You see, you should be seeing everyone's face. So that's important. So it's not about being an individual, even though they are individuals and they're all amazing because they are, but it's also about how to support each other. So if they're out in the field, they should never feel alone. So, like for instance, I was at a facility in Asheville, North Carolina a couple of weeks ago and I had an infection prevention control question. I did know the answer. Um, AC Burke, our vice president of healthcare quality, had already previously educated me on the topic and I felt comfortable. But the client was a little bit iffy. So I said, Would you mind if I called AC? And I picked up the phone and I called her and then she explained it to them. And so they knew she was an infectious disease expert. So it wasn't like this nurse risk manager consultant's just telling me everything. I was able to pull it in. If someone had a clinical reimbursement analytics question, just like at the training here, you know, Katie uh Sleer is going to be uh uh co-presenting with me on some topics that she's by far more expertise than I am now. So um, you know, we look at all of our team members to, you know, what they can give and support. Yes.
SPEAKER_04:That's one thing I always believe as well, and I see that in really the really good leaders, obviously. Uh put people around you that can benefit uh the mission and benefit the vision as well. But you don't have to be the smartest person in the room. No, and you don't want to be the smartest person in the room. But uh just going back to uh something that you mentioned that triggered a question for me, uh, in regards to continuity. One thing I always say in long-term care in a lot of facilities is having that continuity between uh your facility leaders. Uh, with that changing so much, do you think that impacts what are the what are the aspects you think it impacts in-skilled nursing? Just not having that continuous continuity.
SPEAKER_01:Well, our you know, I think that we were heading in a certain direction, but then when the pandemic hit in, you know, 2020 in March, you know, that really kind of, you know, made a dramatic impact. Yes. Not just the turnover of the direct care staff, which is very important because I mean, if you were a nursing home patient, how many people would you like to see you naked? Think of it that way.
SPEAKER_02:Exactly.
SPEAKER_01:Today it's somebody else, tomorrow it's another person, then it's another person. I don't necessarily think people like that.
SPEAKER_02:No, no.
SPEAKER_01:But the leadership turnover. You know, I have a client the other day I was I was talking with him and we're preparing for a conversation with CMS. And I said, well, let's talk about some of the hard questions you're gonna get asked for. In the short period of time that I've been with you, I've met four administrators, four directors of nursing, and three corporate VPs of clinical services. They're probably gonna ask you in the last three years, how many administrators has the building had? How many directors of nursing has the building had? And then they're gonna look through the last three years of the citation, the tracking and trending, and ask, do you think that the change in leadership has any impact on that? And of course the answer is yes. So, you know, it's it's hard. I mean, there's it's not a slight to some people. There are some people very dedicated and they've, you know, and they're doing a very good job. And that's wonderful. But the challenge is that new leadership brings, you know, new policies, new procedures, new processes. Even if someone works for a large company and they have, you know, policies that are pre-established, it's still the implementation of them. So, you know, if you were an employee, like sometimes there'll be a facility where you just meet this superstar who's been there for 20 years of their life and they're so dedicated to the residents, and it's beautiful to see. And they'll talk about the impact of, you know, the 17 administrators they've gotten to work with. Yeah, yeah. And it's, you know, a little bit breaks my heart, you know, to see them have to struggle that way.
SPEAKER_04:Right. That's very honest. I used to be a former administrator myself. So a lot of facilities that when I took over, uh CNAs and nurses would tell me they never even met an administrator before. And that was shocking to understand as well. Uh, but thank you for sharing that. I would like to ask you as well, what are two trends that you've noticed in long-term care that you think could use uh improvement?
SPEAKER_01:We don't spend enough time training and educating people and validating their competency. And I think if we could spend more time to do that, then people would have more confidence. But to be honest, that's kind of like an unfunded mandate. So, you know, you can't, you know, you you can only do what you get paid for.
SPEAKER_04:You're very true.
SPEAKER_01:And there are only so many hours in a day, so I don't say that lightly. So I think that that's an area that I would love to see more support for. And then also, you know, more leadership training. Yes, you know, a director of nursing in particular, you go to school to be a nurse, you do not go to school to be a director of nursing. An administrator gets a license in being an administrator. And presumably education and training guides that, at least to some degree.
SPEAKER_04:I never thought about it like that.
SPEAKER_01:But a DO, I mean, when I was a director of nursing, so I've been a CNA, I was an LPN, I became an RN, and I became I was a director of nursing, and I loved that job, and it was a great job. I really did. But you know, it was kind of like probably like being a parent. You don't get a little manual when you get the kid. Well, you know what? When you become a director of nursing, every building's different, everyone's style is different. But I went to school to be a nurse, not a director of nursing of a nursing home.
SPEAKER_04:Right.
SPEAKER_01:So, you know, there's those things to consider, and that's why training is so important.
SPEAKER_04:Yes, it is very important. And just going down, you've touched on every almost every level of in the nursing area as well. Uh, and I noticed something in your introduction you indicated you started as a as a what a candy striper? I was a candy striper. Candy, can you please uh inform me? I didn't look it up purposefully so you could tell me so I can listen to it.
SPEAKER_01:Well, you know, I'm a little older than you, so long time ago the hospitals had a role called a candy striper, and they were volunteers. You were, I think I was 14, and you were a cute little p uh red and white pinafore uniform. That's enough. And uh and you know, you'd answer call bells in the hospital and you know, assist the nurses on the floor, you know, go get ice water, do things, and it was probably a way to also kind of encourage people to see if maybe a career in healthcare was appealing to them. Oh, okay. At you know, at the time my father's best friend was the medical director of the hospital, so I think I just went because I got told to. But I always wanted to be a nurse my whole life.
SPEAKER_04:Whole life. Okay. Well, that's good that you knew that. Because I didn't, I realized I really didn't know. I knew I wanted to be a business owner, probably at that time. But thank you for sharing. I thought that was very unique uh because that's the first time I've seen that. So um It's because you're young. Oh man. Uh so your approach uh when facing uh when you're when a facility or organization uh comes to you for assistance, if you could take me through just your first step uh when evaluating a facility in that in that state and make a call. Hey Robin, we have a facility down in Vero Beach, let's say, and we could use your ass your assistance. What's your first step?
SPEAKER_01:Well, I like to listen to their story. Okay. You know, it's important to have them explain their situation, and that also helps you for when you do research to gather how much of their situation they understand. Sometimes they're brand new, and in their defense, they they really don't know the history because they're brand new. Um, then I do a regulatory review. We look at you know the last three years of surveys and things of that nature so that we can see what the trends are because facilities have cultures, even when the leaders change. The culture does not until someone works to change it. It takes time too to do that. It does take time and commitment to that. And so there, you know, I we try to look at the culture and then we, you know, interview and talk to the staff, you know, go into the employee break room and look at the building and see how it looks. Like, you know, what what's happening in the building that's for employee morale? You know, do they have a family meeting? We're not required, we're required to have a resident council meeting, as you know. We're not required to have a family meeting, but wouldn't it be fun to have that meeting to solicit people's feedback before they complain? So we just kind of look at that, look and see what kind of grievance program they have. Grievance programs are super important.
SPEAKER_04:Um, you know, if uh resident you have a sorry to interject here, I think you did a session on grievance process as well. I have yes.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, grievances are very important because if you don't ask people, then they'll find a way to tell. But they might not tell you, they might call the state or they might complain, and that's why people's senses maybe is declining. It might be that they tell people in a not good way. You know, people like to share, they just share all differently. So, um, but I think grievances are important because it also tells you what the aptitude is of trying to solve problems.
SPEAKER_04:That's true.
SPEAKER_01:And again, there's a lot of unique things about facilities. Sometimes people would love to do a better job at that, but they don't have the resources. So you have to look at that. You know, it could be the systematic process. For instance, I had a facility recently where um the grievance program doesn't have a component missing, was the written resolution in FTEG 585. You're supposed to have the ability to give a written resolution, and there's seven things that have to be included per the guidelines, but they didn't actually have that. So that would be an example of, and they were nice people, they just didn't have the tool to do it. So sometimes it's resources, sometimes it's time, sometimes it's understanding. So we try to just understand their situation, not judge it, because you know, it's not easy. I, you know, I've been, you know, from the CNA on up, and I've also worked as a chief operating officer for nine years of my career. So I understand from different jobs and perspectives that sometimes it's not as easy as it looks.
SPEAKER_02:Right.
SPEAKER_01:And I never want to judge somebody because I could it could have been me. You know, we just want to help them. Our goal is to help people.
SPEAKER_04:Yes. Uh, Dr. Kittle, I'll shift it to you now, sir. Uh so uh how did you merge your passion for healing uh in entertainment? Was it a complete switch for you?
SPEAKER_03:Or it was just it was uh forced upon me, actually. I um sustained a severe back injury and I could no longer work. And actually I was I was quite severe. I I couldn't even dress myself or or couldn't shower. I was quite bad with some per paralysis in the legs, and so I could no longer do that. And kind of an epiphany was I can still heal with music. And actually it's really interesting when you get into the the new field of music and frequency. That's the new thing coming right now in healing, is using music and frequencies to actually heal. They've actually documented uh clinically that certain songs or certain frequencies actually destroy cancer cells. It's a phenomenal new field that's opening up. And so I still feel that I'm a healer. I just switched modalities healing through music.
SPEAKER_04:Healing through music. And also for me, hospice was my introduction to uh music therapy with accent care. So uh I was like when onboarding, you go and you follow different sectors within accent care. So I shadowed uh music therapy for a weekend. It was just life-changing, like just to see the responses from the patients that are maybe no responsive may not be cognitively attacked at the time, uh, but they respond to music in a different way. Well, I have another toe, but it's it's it's a really brilliant thing to see. Um, and then understanding like I didn't even know that was a field of study, like that, you know, people can go to school for it as well. So um I had to look up some of my old uh accent care music therapies, I'm gonna tag them in this as well, but it was that was probably that's a that's a wonderful field that's expanding.
SPEAKER_03:Um, I know we're short on time here, but I had a great example of that. A friend of mine was a guitarist, his father was a professional guitarist, and um he had dementia, he was in a in a long-term care, couldn't remember his son, his name, or anything. He brought his guitar in, put it in his hands, he played it, and then said, Oh son, what are you doing here? He completely came out of it. It's just an example of what the power of music. So it's just gonna go off the microphone this time, or do you have to run that?
SPEAKER_04:You said you're gonna look into the microphone. It'll record right under the camera. So you can go ahead and play.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, so now do it direct. Okay.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_04:As we go into season three, I have to give a special thank you to Dr. Walter Kittle and Robin Blyer for being our first episode. Uh, RBHL, the partner, is a monumental factor in long-term care in the consulting space. Uh, they really help out uh facilities with their compliance and education. Uh and truly, uh, they call it uh Blyer when you're on fire almost. It's almost like a coin phrase. But I encourage organizations and ownerships to utilize RBH health partners prior to what about being proactive with helping structure your clinical uh strategies, clinical outcomes, uh, so that your facility but also your staff are in a great position when it comes to taking care of our most vulnerable population. So thank you, Robin Blair. Uh we actually filmed your episode uh back in July at Florida Healthcare. Uh you and Dr. Kittle invited me to your suite, uh, which is your private setting to actually shoot. And I really thank you because I you was always a guest, I always wanted on the show. I called you to the healthcare musical Lovebirds. Uh and so thank you all for tuning in. Again, be sure to like, comment, and subscribe. Continue to engage and help grow in the platform from the bottom of my heart and from Comfort Managers Consulting, Norman Harris. Thank you forever.
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