Even before the industry was dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic, the average nursing home was operating on a razor-thin profit margin or net loss. That’s because Medicaid reimbursements only cover 70% to 80% of care costs, according to a document released Wednesday by the American Health Care Association / National Center for Assisted Living.
Regular COVID-19 testing of nursing home staff, who are the most likely to introduce the virus to a facility and spread it to residents, has been sanctioned by experts as one of the most important ways to contain outbreaks. Yet a patchwork of state and federal recommendations have hampered efforts to devise a uniform policy for the testing and led to disputes over whether insurers or employers should cover testing costs, according to a Tuesday New York Times report.
Ryan Wernberg has lived in three different Wisconsin-based nursing homes in the past year. The moves haven’t been by choice — they’ve been the result of facility closings, according to an analysis Monday in the Wausau Daily Herald.
Skilled nursing occupancy numbers suffered their biggest hit since 2012 in March, as the initial effects of the COVID-19 pandemic began to set in. According to monthly data released Monday from the National Investment Center for Seniors Housing & Care, SNFs suffered a 132-basis point decline from the prior month and a 53-basis point decline from year-end 2019, declining to an occupancy rate of 83.4% in March.
With plenty of balance sheet flexibility, San Clemente, CA-based CareTrust appears ready to weather the pandemic successfully and continue growing in the near term, predict experts at Barron’s and Seeking Alpha.
Concerns are growing about resident loneliness and other coronavirus challenges, but infection risks still loom large.
Nineteen states have granted nursing homes new immunity from civil liability either by executive order or statute, according to a report in TheHill Monday.
In early April, the non-profit San Francisco Campus for Jewish Living’s skilled nursing facility began accepting COVID-positive patients discharged from hospitals, under a directive from the state of California. Since then, none of its prior residents have been infected, nor have any of its staff taking care of the new COVID-positive patients, according to Daniel Ruth, the continuing care retirement community’s president and CEO.
Testing all of the nation’s skilled nursing residents and staff just once for COVID-19 would cost $440 million, according to data released Wednesday from the American Health Care Association/National Center for Assisted Living.
Long-term care providers around the country are struggling to hire and retain workers amid the coronavirus pandemic.
