Low census at the Grand Traverse Pavilions has the county-owned nursing facility in the red. The difference is being made up by “vouchers” from a Grand Traverse County fund to the tune of about $3.5 million — an amount that is growing every month. The Pavilions is waiting on more than $10 million in Employee Retention Benefit money and Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements, CEO Rose Coleman reported several times this year. That payment might come in September.
Vincent Tata, RN, has been named director of patient services for HCR Home Care’s Finger Lakes Certified Home Health Agency. In that role, he will supervise the day-to-day clinical operations and all patient care for the CHHA. Tata brings more than a decade of experience to this new role. Most recently, he served as senior manager of clinical operations at UR Medicine Home Care. A resident of Ogden, Monroe County, he earned a master’s degree in school administration/supervision and bachelor’s degrees in sports medicine and health/physical education K-12 from Canisius College.
Hundreds of aspiring nurse aides in Massachusetts can start taking their certification exams in Spanish and Chinese next year, the start of a multilingual policy to tackle a major workforce shortage in long-term care facilities.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) has begun posting nursing home affiliations on Nursing Home Care Compare. CMS’ goal in publishing the information is to help consumers more easily identify related facilities and understand overall performance of commonly owned facilities. The agency will link facilities based on common owners and publish aggregate nursing home performance data on data.cms.gov. This data includes inspection results, staffing levels, quality metrics, and other relevant information.
Just under 25% of Missouri’s nursing home facilities have not received a state-required inspection in at least 2 years. Federal law requires such facilities to be inspected every 15 months, while state laws require a check every year. Though a backlog of inspections resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic is a likely contributing factor, state officials report a vast increase in the number and severity of complaints filed against facilities across the state.
Using UV light for disinfection is common in medicine, but a Nova Scotia doctor is exploring a new application of the practice. With funding from Research Nova Scotia, Dr. Kenneth Rockwood is studying whether UV lights mounted in the ceiling of long-term care homes can kill airborne viruses and reduce infections. "This is an important problem because even before the pandemic, it was a very common cause of death," said Rockwood, a geriatrician with Nova Scotia Health.