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The Long-Term Care Imperative recently completed an analysis of care center occupancy for the first quarter of this year. Compared to last year, it shows some improvement but nothing close to a return to pre-pandemic occupancy levels.

With the 1135 waiver ending on June 6, members will have until Oct. 6 to place Nursing Assistants on the state registry. Minnesota State and the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) communicate weekly updates to LeadingAge Minnesota regarding nursing assistant test sites as they open and increase their capacity.

On Friday, April 29, the legislature passed a bill to provide frontline workers a bonus check for their commitment to serving our community during the height of the pandemic. The measure will use $500 million of federal funds to provide "hero" payments to an estimated 667,000 frontline workers in specified sectors, including long-term care and home care settings like nursing homes and assisted living.

Aging services providers across the state face dire financial conditions that jeopardize access to care for Minnesota's seniors, according to a recent survey conducted by the Long-Term Care Imperative.

LeadingAge Minnesota’s Nurse Leadership Certificate Program is the premier training program for new and emerging nurse leaders in skilled care and assisted living settings. It begins May 17 and is scheduled over five months, including in-person and virtual sessions.

Fellows for LeadingAge Minnesota’s 2022 Leadership Academy have been selected.

This year, 56 leaders will comprise the largest cohort in this program's history. They represent the diversity of the profession, service settings, geographic regions, and organizational profiles within our membership.

Jon Lundberg, CEO of Ebenezer, was named Executive of the Year by the Minnesota Real Estate Journal in an awards ceremony held on April 21, 2022.

Mary Krueger will be retiring as the CEO of Glenwood Retirement Village on May 6.

Her career has spanned 48 years, most of it spent serving older adults in long-term senior care settings. Mary began as a nursing assistant in 1974 at the age of 16. She graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Mankato State University in 1980 and served as director of nursing at St John's Lutheran Home in Springfield, MN.

Saint Therese Board of Directors has completed its nationwide search for a new chief executive and named Craig W. Abbott as its incoming President & Chief Executive Officer. He will join Saint Therese in late May.

The expedited Paid Feeding Assistant training allowed by CMS throughout the pandemic will end in June.

Last year, the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) modified the minimum training requirement for Paid Feeding Assistants from eight hours to one hour under a waiver from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). In an April 7 Memorandum, CMS announced it will terminate the waiver on June 6.

A critical COVID-19 waiver allowing Basic Care Aids to serve seniors through the pandemic is expiring; caregivers must be on the Nursing Assistant Registry by Oct. 6.

In public comments filed last week, Argentum and LeadingAge urged the Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) not to make the agency's Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) for COVID-19 a permanent part of the regulatory landscape.

Legacy Licensed Assisted Living Directors (LALD) are nearing their first license renewal. The Board of Executives for Long Term Services and Supports (BELTSS) will soon send information about the renewal process to those who must renew.

As part of Leading Age Minnesota’s Assisted Living Director Licensing Course, we are seeking assisted living settings to serve as field experience sites for assisted living director (ALD) students.

The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) will be sending you renewal information on or before May 1 for your assisted living license renewal for conversion licenses. MDH developed materials to help you prepare your assisted living license renewal application on the MDH website.

On Tuesday, April 26, the Minnesota Senate passed SF 4410, its Health and Human Services (HHS) Omnibus Bill on a strong bipartisan vote (60-5). The measure includes $358 million in investments for nursing homes and improves Minnesota's Elderly Waiver rate phase-in (from 18.8% to 27.2%).

On Monday, May 2, LeadingAge Minnesota will launch an exciting new resource to allow members to track and benchmark critical workforce data. In LeadingAge Minnesota's data portal, members can access a new workforce data application containing data entry and comparison reports on employee turnover, employee retention, and vacancy rates for each quarter. 

Legislative leaders reached a tentative deal today to restore the Unemployment Insurance Trust and issue frontline worker bonuses, a stalemate that has plagued elected officials for months.

Free sign-up for Minnesota Geriatrics ECHO is now open to LeadingAge Minnesota members.

LeadingAge Minnesota’s Nurse Leadership Certificate Program is the premier training program for new and emerging nurse leaders in skilled care and assisted living settings. It begins May 17 and is scheduled over five months, including in-person and virtual sessions.

Barb Rode, President & CEO of Saint Therese, will be inducted into the McKnight's Hall of Honor, a distinction given to women at an executive level in the senior living industry who have had a significant effect on their organization or industry. On May 13 in Chicago, she will be inducted at McKnight's 2022 Women of Distinction awards celebration.

Health Dimensions Group, Argentum, ASHA, and NIC have teamed up with CARE to champion a philanthropic effort to raise funds to help seniors in Ukraine with desperately needed food and shelter.

Humans are wired for genuine social connection. People who are more isolated than they want to be find they are less happy, their health declines earlier in midlife, their brain functioning declines sooner, and they live shorter lives than people who are not lonely. To realize the benefits of our social connections, we need to be our true selves and take off the figurative masks of who we think we need to be and be who we are.

This week, April 17-23, is Careers in Aging Week! The Gerontological Society of American hosts Careers in Aging Week every year to bring greater awareness and visibility to the wide-ranging career opportunities in the aging services field.

Workforce challenges have become even more acute in the wake of COVID-19. One way to retain the caregivers and staff you have is to help them achieve their higher education goals and advance their careers within the aging services field where they are so needed. To that end, the LeadingAge Minnesota Foundation offers educational scholarships to eligible caregivers and other employees of our member organizations for 2022.

The latest LeadingAge quarterly survey of affordable housing providers shows lower COVID-19 cases among residents in senior housing communities across the country. However, the survey results also show higher rates of COVID-19 among staff and persistent challenges in hiring and retaining service coordinators and other staff.

Periodically, the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) may update the Nurse Aide Candidate Handbooks and Mock Skills to reflect the most current guidance.

Recently members have raised questions relating to resubmitting background studies for individuals hired during the COVID-19 waiver period, and this article addresses some of the common issues we are seeing.

The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) has more than enough funding to cover all currently moratorium exceptions projects proposed by nursing homes across the state.

The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) updated its test reporting guidance, making reporting negative or inconclusive COVID-19 test results optional for nursing homes.