Providers must detail how they spent Provider Relief Fund payments, per new HHS guidance
By
Danielle Brown
Sep 22, 2020
Operators who received more than $10,000 in Provider Relief Fund payments must now submit healthcare-related expenses attributable to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to new guidance released by the Department...
Governor signs bill that gives nursing homes $700 million funding boost
By
Danielle Brown
Jun 02, 2022
A $700 million Medicaid funding boost is coming to Illinois providers after Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) on Tuesday signed nursing home reform legislation that ties the Medicaid increases to higher staffing...
Tracing cases: How one bar gathering led to a nursing home resident’s COVID hospitalization
By
Alicia Lasek
Apr 07, 2021
A new report on contact tracing in rural Illinois illustrates how a single community gathering can lead directly to infections in a skilled nursing facility, and the challenges associated with reopening...
Lawmakers push to keep ‘ineffective’ new opioids from market
By
Alicia Lasek
Mar 08, 2023
Congressional lawmakers have renewed efforts to give the Food and Drug Administration more power to deny drug applications for opioids that are not proven clinically superior to and lower risk than currently...
FDA proposes two annual COVID shots for seniors in ‘simplified’ vaccine schedule
By
Alicia Lasek
Jan 24, 2023
In an effort to streamline COVID-19 protection, older adults and others vulnerable to severe disease would receive two annual shots of an updated vaccine, according to a plan to be evaluated on Thursday...
Call for tougher SNF licensing rules loses support
By
Danielle Brown
Jun 23, 2022
A measure aimed at strengthening California’s licensing requirements for potential buyers of skilled nursing facilities has begun to lose steam among some lawmakers following changes that reshaped the...
Clinical ‘wake-up call’: Hispanics, Latinos remain undertreated for cardiovascular risk
By
Alicia Lasek
Mar 05, 2021
“I didn’t expect the numbers to be so dismal,” says the author of a study of stroke survivors from the Hispanic Community Health Study/Study of Latinos.
Full-time clinicians in nursing homes nearly doubled in a decade, research shows
By
Danielle Brown
Dec 09, 2021
Nursing home operators have not only admitted an increasingly frail number of patients, they’ve also hired a correspondingly larger pool of clinicians to treat them, according to a decade-long research...
Congress advisers back permanent telehealth expansions, look to nix in-person rule for behavioral telehealth...
By
Kimberly Marselas
Apr 12, 2024
Maintaining Medicare beneficiaries’ access to telehealth services, especially for behavioral health, must remain an initial priority over payment reform or quality measurement, members of a congressional...
More flexibility key to nursing homes staying competitive for RNs
By
Danielle Brown
Jul 26, 2022
A top wage expert urged skilled nursing providers to be more flexible with shift hours and reward loyalty to their registered nurses in order to stay competitive against other healthcare sectors after...