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Observation days are gaining some interest in Congress as more and more consumers express concerns regarding surprise medical bills. 

A Team Approach to Operationalizing PDPM is a full day workshop coming this July to four cities to help your interdisciplinary team get prepared for the Oct. 1, 2019 implementation of Patient Driven Payment Model (PDPM).  

While expressing a few concerns, Argentum, LeadingAge and other associations representing older adult services called the federal government’s proposed salary threshold of $35,308, under which executive, administrative, professional and certain other employees would be eligible for overtime pay if they work more than 40 hours in a week, reasonable. 

The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) is sponsoring workshops in July to support long-term care settings in writing an effective antibiotic stewardship policy. The workshops, which will take place in  Marshall, Duluth and Saint Paul, are most beneficial when three to four individuals from the same setting, both clinical and administrative, are able to attend together. Workshop details: 

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs is shifting the way in which it works with non-Veterans Affairs (VA) providers to expand the provider network and improve customer service for veterans and timeliness of payments for providers.  

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has officially posted a draft version of the new MDS 3.0 RAI Manual v1.17 Oct. 1, 2019 that will help Skilled Nursing Facilities with transitioning to the Patient-Drive Payment Model.  

Not sure how the outcomes of the 2019 legislative session affect you, your staff and the people you serve? Then you won't want to miss June District meetings. 

The special session that was required to complete work on the state budget ended in the early morning hours of Saturday, May 25. Given all the challenges of the session, with its focus on addressing elder abuse and assisted living oversight and an unexpected proposal to cut funding for senior care, our successes were only made possible by the tireless and unprecedented grassroots advocacy of our members. In the end, we were able pass the historic Elder Care and Vulnerable Adult Protection Act of 2019 and hold off rate cuts for care centers and reductions to Elderly Waiver caps. We also know that there is significant work ahead and issues that were largely unaddressed this year, including Elderly Waiver funding reform and addressing the caregiving workforce shortage. 

Engaging with your staff is an essential way to empower your team, promote a sense of value and to retain your staff. We know that staff who are engaged have higher job satisfaction, show enthusiasm for their work and improve outcomes within your organization.
LeadingAge Minnesota offers a free, web-based toolkit to help boost your ability to engage with staff. 

The annual re-calculation of the Housing Support, formerly Group Residential Housing (GRH), rate that covers rent and raw food for eligible participants has resulted in an increase of $18 per month. The new rate of $922 will be effective July 1, 2019, through June 30, 2020.   

The outcome of the short legislative special session last week turned out to be much more positive for care centers than we had feared for the last few months. The proposed cuts in operating rates, which were in the Governor’s budget proposal and the House budget bill, were dropped from the final Health and Human Services (HHS) budget bill due to objections by the Senate.  

Beginning June 8, 2019, Livanta will replace KEPRO as the Beneficiary and Family Centered Care (BFCC) Quality Improvement Organization (QIO) for Minnesota.  

Get ready to hit the links! Registration is now open for the 2019 LeadingAge MN Foundation Golf Fundraiser, which takes place at Prestwick Golf Club in Woodbury on July 30. This event is a highlight of summer – a great day on fun, fellowship and philanthropy. 

The all-new Connect Conference in August combines three previous popular conferences – Senior Living NOW, Assisted Living & Home Care, and Adult Day - into an interactive experience intentionally designed to bring providers across the home- and community-based continuum together to address issues in common and to shape the future of service to older adults. 

Let’s talk about data! Workforce data in our field can tell a powerful story about the need for resources and recruitment in our profession. Consider bringing this information to your leadership team, an all staff meeting, your Board of Directors, a local Chamber, networking group, place of worship, or even the family members and supporters of your organization.  

The 2019 Adult Day Services Financial Indicators Study has been launched, and we strongly encourage adult day members to participate. The study, now in its ninth year, offers Adult Day Services members the opportunity to benchmark their individual centers to the rest of the field and determine their financial health and performance.  

LeadingAge National will launch a biennial survey of its members on June 6, and we strongly encourage members to take part in this initiative as it will produce a host of meaningful data that you can use to conduct data-driven planning and decision making. Here are four ways the LeadingAge member survey can help you tell your story: 

The first installment of LeadingAge Minnesota’s webinar series, Top 10 Life Safety Code Violations and How to Avoid Them, focused on preparing for your federal fire/life safety recertification survey.   

The Minnesota Department of Human Services (DHS) has announced two small grant programs for Medicaid-certified nursing homes with applications due by July 1. 

In the final hours of the 2019 legislative session, the Minnesota Legislature passed landmark legislation that ushers in the next generation of assisted living services. The new framework provides greater clarity and transparency for consumers, strengthened regulatory oversight and consumer protection, and maintains a model of senior living that supports choice, options and the opportunity to age in place. We know you have questions about this legislation and what it means to you, your operations and the people you serve. Here are three immediate ways to learn more and a way to provide us with your feedback: 

Register your interdisciplinary team today for one of four July workshops, A Team Approach to Operationalizing PDPM, to prepare for the Oct.1 implementation of the Patient Drive Payment Model (PDPM) classification system for Medicare Part A payments. The new system has significant implications for clinical operations, pre-admission screening, IDT documentation, and may even influence the types of individuals you will admit. 

With the need to provide qualified and competent staff in Skilled Nursing Facilities, it may be challenging for a setting to find useable resources and tools to determine competency. LeadingAge excited to announce that the Staff Competency Toolkit© is now available to members.

More than 4,300 older adults who had found solace and affordability in their HUD-assisted homes will now wonder about the stability of their housing as the result of a new proposed rule that would end the practice of having “mixed status” families in federally assisted housing.   

The 2019 legislative session came to an end on May 20 with most of this year’s budget bills unfinished, including the Health and Human Services Finance bill. A special session will be required to get these bills across the finish line. What does that mean for us? We just gained the gift of time in our fight to stop the devastating nursing home cuts proposed by Governor Tim Walz and the Minnesota House. But time is running out – the special session may take place on Thursday and Friday. 

LeadingAge Minnesota has agreed along with its Imperative partner and organizations representing consumers and their families to support an historic compromise bill to enhance regulatory oversight and consumer protection in assisted living settings and nursing homes.  

The Minnesota Department of Human Services has extended the public comment period for the latest round of evidentiary packages written for home and community-based settings (HCBS) across to June 9. 

The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) held a statewide regulatory call for care centers on May 13 and shared updates on commonly-cited deficiencies and other topics. MDH will post a recording and transcript of the call on its webpage shortly. Meanwhile, here are a few highlights from the call:  

Unfortunately, cuts to care centers are still on the table at the Capitol. But we still have time to act!  

The Minnesota Department of Health periodically receives guidance from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on specific regulatory or survey issues, which the Department will forward to LeadingAge Minnesota and other stakeholders when applicable. This guidance typically comes in the form of an email written by the CMS Central Office in response to a question submitted by a state survey agency or a provider. This week MDH forwarded three questions-and-answers (identified with CMS tracking #s), which it described as clarifications from the Central Office. 

LeadingAge Minnesota is issuing Safety Alert based on an emerging theme we have identified in the Minnesota Office of Health Facility Complaints (OHFC) substantiated maltreatment reports. To help members prevent similar harm in their settings, we are distributing this Safety Alert to share learnings from these events and solutions for consideration.