Medicare Advantage plans forcing providers to take ‘optional’ payment reductions
By
Kimberly Marselas
Nov 15, 2022
Many skilled nursing providers are still underusing Interim Payment Assessments under the nascent Patient Drive Payment Model, but one new pressure is driving some to submit those extra patient evaluations...
Fasten your seatbelts: It MIGHT be a bumpy ride
By
Steven Littlehale
Oct 13, 2023
It’s been a flurry of activity leading up to the implementation of the “new MDS.” For months our industry has been doing what we do best — rising to the occasion. Countless MDS training sessions,...
Skilled nursing angst, grit emerge after PHE end date announced
By
James M. Berklan
Feb 01, 2023
Nursing home leaders were scrambling to understand the full implications of the newly announced end to the public health emergency while also making plans to fight the return of some less flexible conditions.
CMS offering new tool to transition more people away from SNFs
By
Danielle Brown
Jul 26, 2022
The new CMS tool could wind up taking millions of dollars away from SNFs.
Defiant Sloan to nursing home critics: Address funding to tackle staffing challenge
By
Joe Bush
Dec 07, 2022
The leader of one the nation’s largest skilled nursing organizations Tuesday pushed back against a recent popular narrative about understaffing, reiterating concerns about Medicaid pay that continues...
MedPAC pushes 3 percent Medicare SNF cut in report to Congress
By
Kimberly Marselas
Mar 17, 2023
A key body that advises Congress on Medicare policy is calling for a 3% reduction in payments to skilled nursing facilities in fiscal year 2024.
White House to extend PHE designation through April, reports say
By
James M. Berklan
Nov 14, 2022
The federal government will extend the COVID-19 public health emergency declaration until at least April, according to published reports.
Amendments to the public charge rule did not go far enough when it comes to LTC
By
Moroni Fernandez Cajavilca
Jan 27, 2023
Despite the Biden administration’s recent amendments to the criteria of what constitutes a “public charge,” non-citizens of the United States still cannot receive Medicaid-funded long-term care without...
If only nursing homes were banks
By
Brendan Williams
Mar 17, 2023
I went to high school in Iowa, where 19 nursing homes closed in 2022 alone. Surely, you might think, this has prompted a federal response.It isn’t. Instead, the federal government has chosen to bail...
Parkinson: ‘2023 is going to be a tough year’
By
James M. Berklan
Aug 31, 2022
Long-term care leaders are eyeing the next 18 months warily, despite recent victories in the form of better-than-expected Medicare reimbursements for fiscal 2023 and Monday’s partial reprieve on emergency...