Thanks to today’s release of the White House’s long-awaiting nursing home staffing mandate, operators know what they can get started on immediately: Comments critiquing or making recommendations about the administration’s proposal.
Interested stakeholders will have until Nov. 6 to submit comments to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
In what some close observers are calling the nursing home “story of the year,” CMS has proposed mandating nursing homes supply at least 3.0 hours of nursing care per patient per day.
That would go into effect starting in three years for non-rural providers and in five years for rural nursing homes. The agency also wants facilities to have a 24 hour-a-day registered nurse presence starting in two years for the non-rurals and three years for the rurals.
Those are among the highlights of Friday morning’s big announcement, news that McKnight’s first broke to sector LTC professionals before many had sat down to breakfast.
Ongoing coverage of the rule’s parameters and what the implications may be for cash- and staff-strapped providers can be found at mcknights.com and in the McKnight’s Daily Update newsletter. Check back often today and in the coming days for the latest developments.
And if you see something in the regulatory language you want government officials to know about or reconsider, start forming your thoughts to submit before the early-October deadline.
See McKnight’s ongoing coverage for much more information and how to submit comments to regulators.
For more information on how to submit comments or to review the entire CMS rule, visit the Federal Register, where an unpublished version of the proposal now resides..
