Q: What’s your frustration with nursing homes?
A: The nursing home guys I worked with for years, they talk about Medicare, Medicare, Medicare. But the Medicare rates are pretty healthy. And people on Capitol Hill and MedPAC and the administration see 20% or 25% margins and they say, ‘You’re overpaid in Medicare.’ Nursing homes lose a ton of money on Medicaid, which I spent a lot of time at CMS talking about.
Q: What can be done?
A: Nursing homes need to educate people a little more about Medicaid. They get hammered on Medicaid, and they just go back to the Hill and say, ‘Pay us more in Medicare.’
Q: What’s wrong with that?
A: Well, most people in Congress and the administration don’t understand the overall big picture. They say ‘You’re doing great in Medicare.’ So I think it’s a matter of more and more education for people in Washington on how bad Medicaid is.
Q: But there really are no quick fixes, are there?
A: No. The fact is, governors have big fiscal problems. They have more mandates every day saying cover more, and their budgets aren’t in great shape. What are they going to do?
From the November 01, 2012 Issue of McKnight's Long-Term Care News