Editor’s Note: McKnight’s Senior Living, McKnight’s Long-Term Care News and McKnight’s Home Care are profiling the McKnight’s 2023 Pinnacle Awards honorees daily in April and May. For additional McKnight’s Pinnacle Awards content, visit this page.
Among the few apparent certainties in life, one is seeing Leah Klusch imparting her wisdom at a professional conference or during a webinar.
For decades, the long-term care pioneer has been educating others in the industry as a trainer and consultant on how to best care for their elders.
“I do not have a job — I have always had a mission — a dedication to excellence and person centered individualized care,” she told McKnight’s in 2020.
That type of attitude led to her being named a “Business Partner” honoree in the inaugural McKnight’s Pinnacle Awards program this year.
What made Klusch’s mission abundantly clear was an early job. Less than two years removed from earning her nursing degree, she was hired to work in a small town nursing home, where she witnessed misery and little oversight.
The circumstances “woke up my nursing soul,” said Klusch, who earned her nursing degree from Capital University in Columbus, OH, and continued graduate studies at Ohio State University.
After that shock to her system, she began to put together educational materials to improve caregiving and assessment processes. That started her on a journey to launch the Alliance Training Center in Alliance, OH, in 1989, where she still is the executive director.
Klusch has shown no sign of slowing down since. Still actively training and consulting around the country, she also participated in 2017’s Clinical Study of Holistic Continence Care with the University of Pennsylvania, a research investigation focused on sleep hygiene and older adults with nocturnal incontinence and how care could be better modified.
Not bad for a nurse-educator who first was published in 1968 in the American Journal of Nursing. She since has authored more than 40 published articles.
Also of note, Klusch produced the first set of video training materials for the MDS assessment and restorative care in 1985. Her popular lessons have been a mainstay and have been updated whenever regulations have changed.
For industry newcomers, she has offered this advice: “Never let your tasks overcome your empathy. Ours is a very unique responsibility and most rewarding.”
The McKnight’s Pinnacle Awards program is jointly administered by McKnight’s Senior Living, McKnight’s Long-Term Care News and McKnight’s Home Care. Honorees were recognized March 7 at a dinner and awards ceremony in Chicago. The program’s Platinum sponsor was MatrixCare. Omnicare was a Silver sponsor, and additional sponsors included Pinnacle Quality Insight, HealthDirect and Sentrics.
