The covid-19 pandemic drove a collapse in both patient volume and revenue for post-acute care in skilled nursing facilities (SNFs). And while patient numbers have increased modestly since the worst of the pandemic, they remain far below 2019 and probably are financially unsustainable for the SNFs. At the same time, bipartisan federal legislation in the House and Senate would create [...]
As of Monday, only about 22 percent of the covid-19 vaccine doses that have been distributed for use in long-term care facilities have made their way into the arms of residents and staff. As has been well documented, these residents—nearly all with pre-existing medical conditions and functional and cognitive impairment-- are the most vulnerable to serious illness and death from [...]
The Trump Administration has adopted tough new rules aimed at barring low-wage workers from coming to the US. Direct care workers such as personal care aides, home health aides, and certified nursing assistants will be among the biggest victims. But so will frail elders and younger people with disabilities, who will find it even more difficult to get the help [...]
Tough new rules proposed by the Trump Administration would make it effectively impossible for immigrants to come to the US to work as home health aides or as staff at nursing homes or assisted living facilities. Because at least one million aides (one of every four) is an immigrant, the complex rules Trump proposed over the weekend would dry up [...]
As we age, become frail, and need personal assistance, we will increasingly require paid aides to help us with routine daily activities, such as bathing, dressing, or cooking. Demand for those aides will increase by 50 percent over just the next decade, to 3 million. But where will they come from? Aides are poorly paid, have little opportunity for advancement, [...]
I spent this morning at an interesting Capitol Hill conference on an important—but often ignored —topic: What role should home health aides play in the delivery of care to people with chronic disease? Health care providers and policy experts are spending lots of time thinking about ways to better integrate medical and personal care. They are finally recognizing that people [...]