West Virginia’s home health care workers will receive a raise. Gov. Jim Justice and the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources announced last week that the Medicaid program will dedicate additional federal dollars for higher wages and benefits. The funding accumulates to $240 million. “These dollars will help recruit and retain the workforce serving home and community-based services, and provide the needed care for West Virginia’s senior citizens and individuals with disabilities,” Health and Human Resources Secretary Bill Crouch said during Friday’s coronavirus briefing.
After eight days of striking, SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania workers at Shenandoah Heights Healthcare nursing home reached a tentative contract agreement Saturday morning. Workers at Shenandoah Heights were among the roughly 700 unionized workers at 14 nursing homes across Pennsylvania, including Gardens for Memory Care at Easton, who went on strike Sept. 2. The strike occurred after contract negotiations failed to produce a deal in a dispute over pay, benefits and staffing levels.
Striking Pennsylvania nursing home employees, including those at The Grove at Washington, have reached a tentative agreement with Comprehensive Healthcare and Priority Healthcare, the nurses’ union SEIU Healthcare announced Friday. Hundreds of nursing home workers who spent more than a week on picket lines across the state paused their strike Friday to discuss and vote on ratifying new contracts. Strikes began throughout the state Sept. 2, when nearly 700 nursing home employees walked off the job to fight for better staffing, better wages and better healthcare.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) recent decision on home healthcare services, if implemented, will increase overall healthcare expenditures and decrease the quality of services received by patients.
CMS' overarching goal is praiseworthy; the agency is trying to maintain budget neutrality while changing its payment system rates. A more praiseworthy goal would be to reduce expenditures but that is a different question, the larger problem is that CMS' proposed expenditure reductions will more likely increase spending over time.
For new mom and Danbury resident Marcia Valdes, a local program for first-time mothers and their babies has provided an invaluable support system. The town’s Visiting Nurse Association’s rising Nurse Family Partnership program has been around for about 40 years - starting in Colorado and making it’s way to Connecticut two years ago. “I love it,” Valdes said of the program. “It’s great because as a first-time mom, you have a lot of questions. You’re always concerned … things change because your life’s changed.”