Where will patients go when nursing homes close? Consider this uncomfortable possibility
By
Kimberly Marselas
Jan 30, 2024
Licensed practical nurse Kim Neuhalfen is scared about what the future holds. Mostly for her patients, sure, but also for the setting that she’s come to love in some ways more than all the others.
CMS must ‘ease burdens’ if it wants more long-stay residents in value-based care: report
By
Kimberly Marselas
Jan 29, 2024
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services must do more to move states away from an “extremely bifurcated” Medicare and Medicaid system that sometimes leaves dually eligible beneficiaries confused...
‘Crying wolf’ or dying breed? Incentives often ignore plight of rural skilled nursing operators
By
Kimberly Marselas
Jan 29, 2024
As hundreds of nursing homes have shuttered in the last few years, the very strategies meant to prop up the sector have often left the most isolated, resource-strapped facilities with nothing gained.
A key Medicaid advisory body appears ready to recommend new appeal opportunities for millions of Managed Medicaid beneficiaries and to add more oversight to better ensure plans cover medically necessary...
CMS: Expect final nursing home staffing rule this year
By
Kimberly Marselas
Jan 23, 2024
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services plans to finalize its minimum staffing rule for nursing homes during 2024, an official confirmed Tuesday during a national stakeholder call.
Pressing questions about rural telehealth access and investments put innovation in danger
By
Kimberly Marselas
Jan 22, 2024
Questions remain about how much providers will be able to rely on telehealth, remote monitoring and other technologies to come in the years ahead — and whether the government will make the needed legal,...
‘Heightened risk’ as class action settlements spike, but arbitration offers critical protection
By
Kimberly Marselas
Jan 17, 2024
The number of class action settlements in 2023 outpaced predictions for the second year in a row, which will likely incentivize the plaintiffs bar to be even more aggressive in seeking class standing,...
Rural nursing homes’ livelihood may depend on non-existent staff
By
Kimberly Marselas
Jan 15, 2024
In August, Candace Carey left her job of eight years — monitoring eggs at a nearby chicken farm for nearly $18 an hour — and took a pay cut to watch over and tend to human beings instead as a CNA.
Gripped by uncertainty, skilled nursing providers just keep breathing
By
Kimberly Marselas
Jan 10, 2024
Uncertainty may very well be the defining outlook for skilled nursing providers in 2024. At the very least, it was the theme that dominated our annual survey attempting to capture your attitudes heading...
Empty beds, untenable staffing needs push the nation’s rural nursing homes closer to the brink
By
Kimberly Marselas
Jan 08, 2024
Like many of its skilled nursing neighbors in the Cornhusker State, Good Samaritan Society-Bloomfield is teetering between fulfilling its vital community role with special small-town flourishes and succumbing...