The Spanberger administration is touting two new policies aimed at strengthening oversight of nursing homes, which are home to 29,000 Virginia seniors, in one of our 291 certified nursing home facilities.
The Virginia Department of Health, per a release from the administration that went out on Thursday, has issued new guidance that provides a consistent framework for considering sanctions against nursing homes based on factors including the severity of violations, potential or actual harm to residents, a facility’s compliance history, and its response to identified deficiencies.
The guidance builds on VDH’s broader Nursing Home Oversight Roadmap, which outlines steps to improve regulatory operations, timeliness, consistency and accountability.
“Families should be able to trust that when a loved one enters a nursing home, they will be safe and well cared for, no matter where they live in Virginia,” Secretary of Health and Human Resources Marvin B. Figueroa said. “That requires strong oversight from the Commonwealth, but it also requires nursing homes to meet high standards, invest in their workforce, and act quickly when care falls short. These changes are about creating clearer expectations and stronger incentives so that everyone is pulling in the same direction for residents and their families.”
“Accountability only works when it’s consistent. With this guidance, a nursing home that fails to meet standards is held to the same framework whether it’s in Southwest Virginia or Northern Virginia,” State Health Commissioner Dr. Cameron Webb said. “It’s a key step in our Nursing Home Oversight Roadmap, and we’re continuing that work to make our oversight more timely, more consistent, and more accountable for residents in every corner of the Commonwealth.”
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The second new policy encourages higher staffing levels at nursing facilities.
The Department of Medical Assistance Services is raising the staffing benchmarks used to measure nursing home performance in the Nursing Facility Value-Based Purchasing Program.
Nursing homes will now need to meet higher staffing benchmarks to qualify for the program’s higher quality incentive payments.
The change is intended to create a stronger financial incentive for nursing homes to increase staffing.
“Adequate staffing is fundamental to the quality of care residents receive in nursing facilities,” DMAS Director Steve Ford said. “By raising staffing benchmarks in our value-based purchasing program, we’re encouraging nursing facilities to invest in their workforce and helping Virginia move toward stronger staffing levels and better care for residents.”
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We wrote last month about how VDH uses five overworked teams of certification inspectors to try to keep tabs on how our nursing homes are doing, but because we haven’t prioritized basic inspections in forever, 58 percent, according to a ProPublica study, were overdue for getting a routine look-over from the state, and that same ProPublica study found that 68 of our nursing homes – 23.4 percent, so, just about one in four – were found to have serious deficiencies.
The good news coming: the General Assembly, earlier this year, approved funding to hire eight complaint investigators, which will allow the certification teams that had responsibility for both – certifications and complaints – can focus on reducing the recertification backlog.
In theory, reduce the recertification backlog – state law requires that nursing homes go through the recertification process every 15.9 months – and that should reduce the number of complaints.
It’s a good working theory that they have there.
Now, we just need to get it from theory to practice.
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Chris Graham
