Guest Columns
In 1986, the Supreme Court held that workplace harassment constitutes sex discrimination and is unlawful under the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In 1991, the Supreme Court nomination hearings for Clarence Thomas transfixed the public’s attention, when Anita Hill accused Thomas of sexual harassment at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, prompting many women to come…
Spring has sprung and I am finally seeing my neighbors in their yards again. We’re washing cars, watering seedlings, rototilling and playing with our dogs. I have a neighbor who is a very smart and enterprising nurse who works in a local emergency room. We recently finally got a chance to talk after all these…
The COVID-19 pandemic has tested our nation. For long-term care providers, including nursing facilities and assisted living centers, the pandemic has exacerbated our chronic challenges of a severe caregiver shortage, inadequate government payment and for some, an antiquated building infrastructure. Through it all, our courageous, devoted and hardworking caregivers showed up for work every day…
Six months after the COVID-19 vaccines first became available, just 55% of the CNAs, nurses and therapists who work at our 50-bed skilled nursing facility have chosen to get vaccinated. It’s a challenge, as I’m sure many other nursing facility administrators agree. We know how important it is for our staff members, especially direct care…
Can a one-star skilled nursing facility be the same as a five-star facility? It depends on your zip code. When the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services assigns the health inspection rating domain, which drives the overall star rating calculation, it stratifies performance within each state before giving one to five stars based on percentiles. …
In his 1964 State of the Union Address, President Lyndon B. Johnson declared that “[e]very American community will benefit from the construction or modernization of schools and libraries and hospitals and nursing homes” – perhaps the last time nursing homes had so prominent a place in a statement of the nation’s ambitions. We could use…
I will admit that I am a fair-weather flip-flop type of walker. My toes are the happiest when they can wave at the sky and the ground with each step I take. Yet, the other day, each step was uncomfortable. I did the regular shaking of the foot, thinking I had sent the causation of…
On an annual basis, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services updates various payment systems within the Traditional (fee-for-service) Medicare program. This regulatory season is more entertaining than most because it offers insight into the first concrete policy positions on Medicare from the new Biden administration. Of particular interest is how the new administration intends…
When you get three outstanding long-term care influencers on the same webinar panel and they’re talking the key issues of the day it pays to listen.
After a year that has required long term care facilities to manage various, often competing, considerations while making a series of difficult decisions, they now are grappling with the question of whether they can require employees to get vaccinated. Understandably, in the wake of the pandemic’s devastating effects on both residents and staff, LTC facilities…
The recent events of the Colonial Pipeline gas shortage in the Southeast have highlighted a very real concern for our nation’s cybersecurity. Cyber criminals are still out there, and seemingly stronger than ever — and long-term care remains one of the biggest targets.
With the roll out of vaccines and slowing rates of COVID-19 infections, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has not shifted its survey focus away from infection control. Instead, the agency released new guidance to surveyors continuing focus on infection control during annual and complaint surveys, including additional F-tags. This focus, while timely, will…
America has a social contract for long-term care. It’s rarely acknowledged, but here it is. If you are stricken by a need for long-term care that you cannot afford, we help you even if you are not poor. Assuming you’re eligible medically, you’ll qualify for Medicaid as long as your income is (1) less than…
The COVID-19 pandemic, which initially affected the long-term care community disproportionately, led to significant changes within skilled nursing centers. As we continue to emerge from COVID and the overall number of cases continues to decrease, we have an opportunity to reflect on how our experiences may influence the future. Although the workforce within post-acute and…
I encourage all nurses to reflect on why you became a nurse.
Addressing staffing without addressing the antiquated payment model and the difficulty recruiting the workforce for long-term care is like fixing only one leg of a three-legged stool.
The Year of the Nurse, designated by the World Health Organization and others, was to be 2020. But in 2020, nurses were too busy fighting a battle with an invisible enemy to acknowledge, “The Year of the Nurse.”
Patients — and our patients — are a virtue. Let’s not forget that.
Here at Shaker Place Rehabilitation and Nursing Center, we had no idea when our $80 million renovation project began that we would soon need every resource our new facility provided to face obstacles imposed by COVID-19. It wasn’t easy to get to this point, but with courage, strength and the will to succeed, Shaker Place…
Private equity companies are not so naïve to think they can just come in and change nursing home operations for the worse just to make a buck.
