Week 6 DB Post (This is my classmate’s response. You should respond/reply to her post)

1) What is quality in nursing homes and other LTSS settings? How can you recognize it? One way to measure quality is through report cards. How useful are these report cards and do you think that consumers can use these tools effectively? Why or why not?

Quality is difficult to define in any health care setting and especially difficult in the LTSS settings. Often what family members may perceive to be quality may not be as valuable to the resident. For example, safety is of obvious importance but, when the safety of a resident is valued more than the quality of their life, residents may not feel that they are in a quality nursing facility. Along this line, I think that respect for patients’ values, preferences and expressed needs is most important when defining quality as well as emotional support and involvement of family/friends.

Report cards can be a helpful tool in determining quality but should never be the only source. As stated previously, there are certain attributes that a family member might find attractive when choosing a facility but this may not be as important to a resident. Report cards may be skewed as the data may be more positive for facilities that have more active, less frail residents and, the categories that are highlighted in some reports may not be a true reflection on how residents feel living in the facility. As noted in lecture, some feel that residents can just leave if they do not like the facility but it is not easy to be shifted from place to place when someone is elderly and/or very frail.

2) Based on the articles about fraud, abuse, and quality concerns prior to and even more so during COVID, what can be done to ensure that facilities who serve highly vulnerable people offer high quality?

Because family and friends are unable to visit during COVID, it is important than watchdog groups are more vigilant during this time. Facilities should report any transition of patients into or out of the facility which will direct attention to facilities that have a high turnover rate and may indicate that they are removing patients in favor of those who may be privately insured or higher income in order to increase profits as indicated in the NYT article. Close attention must also be paid to reported staffing ratios to ensure that facilities are consistently staffed well and anonymously reported surveys should be given to employees of facilities in order to track the situation more effectively. Employees will be honest about the state of affairs especially when surveyed anonymously.

3) What agency (or agencies) licenses nursing facilities in your selected state? What about residential care such as assisted living? For those of you working in facilities: How do you feel about the MDS 3.0 as a means to measure characteristics of those you serve and as a means to compare facilities? (The question about MDS 3.0 is optional to answer)

The Illinois Department of Public Health licenses, regulates and inspects the nursing facilities in Illinois. The Illinois Department of Public Health, specifically their Office of Health Care Regulation, is in charge of regulating assisted living.