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Thousands of young and middle-aged adults with serious mental illnesses live in U.S. nursing homes, putting frail nursing home residents at risk for serious injury or death, according to a report gathered by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services prepared exclusively for the Associated Press.
The Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services has issued its most serious citation against a Winchester nursing home and as a result it will lose its Medicare and Medicaid funding, according to the Lexington (Kentucky) Herald-Leader. The citation is based on claims of abuse and neglect at Winchester Centre for Health and Rehabilitation that Health and Family Services officials would not detail. However Nursing Home Ombudsman Agency executive director Kathy Gannoe says her agency has received 31 complaints about the nursing home. Almost all were resolved satisfactorily, she says. However, the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services plans to move forward on its plans to terminate its contract with the home by February 7.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services last week posted a new system on its Web site, Nursing Home Compare, that rates all Medicare- and Medicaid-certified nursing homes with a five-star system.
Measuring the quality of a nursing home is not always clear-cut. More that 1.5 million people live in 15,000 nursing homes throughout the country. Each facility is inspected annually and must meet federal standards in order to participate in Medicaid and Medicare. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has established the site to give the public a better understanding of how nursing homes compare to others.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is paying millions of dollars in taxpayer money each year to nursing homes, some of which have been cited for below-average care, according to a report by the Des Moines (Iowa) Register. The monies come from bonuses paid to nursing homes for following programs that in many cases are legally required, such as paying minimum wages and installing fire sprinklers for resident safety.
Pleasant Manor Nursing Home in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was anything but pleasant for some residents there, according to the Tulsa World.
For one resident and her family, it was downright stressful.
How is it possible that it is only now becoming a requirement that nursing home facilities install life-saving sprinkler systems to help protect residents from fire? Up to this point, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) allowed older facilities that did not have these systems an exemption, allowing them to serve Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries despite the lack of this safety precaution. This week, the organization announced these facilities will have a five-year phase-in period, after which time they must have comprehensive sprinkler systems in place.
This week the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced plans for the establishment of a new ranking system for nursing home performance. Similar to rating systems that the public is familiar with in relation to products or facilities like restaurants and hotels, the new CMS system will rate nursing homes with a “star” system, with five stars being the best and one star the worst.
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