Although three months late, the Biden administration and CMS finally came out with their proposal for minimum staffing requirements for nursing homes. They should have waited longer, but what would be the point? They were tone deaf to the staffing problems anyway.
The proposed change includes a minimum of 0.55 hours of care from an RN every day, a minimum of 2.45 hours from a certified nurse’s aide per day, but these are the floors. In addition, an RN will have to be on site 24 hours a day. That is going to be very tough for many facilities.
Rural nursing homes will have up to five years to meet the proposed standards, and non-rural facilities up to three years. There will be a 60-day comment period, but really, what more can the industry say that has not been said these past several months. CMS is not listening.
In a case of the cart before the horse, they are also proposing about $75 million for “initiatives” to help with the staffing shortfalls. Any initiatives to help staffing should be before the new hours go into effect, and $75 million isn’t even close to enough. We do not expect many, if any, changes after 60 days.
What is distressing is that a recent study said that staffing levels do not determine the quality of care. So, what happens if the proposed hours go into effect and the quality stays the same or goes down? It won’t matter, because no one listens.
