SB 2059 seeks to fund more mentors at a variety of health care providers, and that's welcome news for Texas nursing homes which are showing the highest vacancy rates for RNs in the entire country.
Nursing homes have been pressing for more money from the state and federal governments, by far their biggest payers. Now they are close to getting it, but the extra payments may come with costly new obligations, especially related to staffing.
Nuvance Health is closing its Thompson House skilled nursing facility in Rhinebeck. The facility, opened in 1994, has 38 patients. A mid-May closing is anticipated, and all residents will be provided with new residences. Staff members will also be transitioned to comparable open positions in the health system, hospital officials said. “It has not been an easy decision,” said Richard Cleland, interim administrator. “We only reluctantly came to this decision based on the difficult landscape facing nursing home facilities.”
Home health care workers and their clients are among several groups that have come to the State Capitol in the days leading up to the state budget deadline. They’re demanding that any agreement that raises the minimum wage must include them. Home care workers and their allies unfurled a 100-foot-long banner that they said lists names of people across New York who are on waiting lists for care. “Governor Hochul, do you care?” they chanted.
The Common Council unanimously voted last week to authorize the development of a comprehensive response to the crisis in home health care in Madison. The Common Council directed the Disability Rights Commission to develop a plan to submit to the council by Oct. 1 detailing steps the city should take to improve access to home healthcare for older residents and people with disabilities. This legislation was championed by District 12 Ald. Barbara Vedder, who stepped into the Common Council as interim alder in January 2023 to fill the vacancy left by former Ald. Syed Abbas after his resignation in November 2022.
New York state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli's office will conduct a follow-up assessment of the state Department of Health's handling of nursing homes during the COVID-19 pandemic. The announcement made Wednesday by DiNapoli's office comes three years after a controversial order that required nursing homes at the start of the pandemic to not turn away COVID-19 positive patients. The initial review by DiNapoli found New York officials under counted the number of nursing home residents who died in the initial months of the pandemic, a finding that was also backed by an investigation by state Attorney General Letitia James.