The budget (SB 2000) provides $2.727 billion for nursing home care which reflects a 6.5 percent cut ($187.5 million) to nursing home funding, which amounts to an average reduction of $288,932 annually per facility or $12.07 per Medicaid patient day. FHCA has developed documents estimating the impact of the 6.5 percent reduction, including facility-specific impacts by House and Senate district and summaries by county, which you can access by clicking here.
The budget does not eliminate nor modify bed hold policy and funding. Adult vision, hearing and dental services were fully funded. Also included in the budget are $26.1 million for the Assistive Care Services, $35.1 million for the Assisted Living Facility Waiver, $355.8 million for the Capitated Nursing Home Diversion Waiver and $14.3 million for the Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE). Nursing home funding for case load growth was utilized to fund 1,000 additional Diversion Waiver slots, 1,250 additional Aging and Disabled Waiver slots and 275 additional PACE slots. And finally, there were no funding cuts to the Medically Needy and MEDS-AD programs.
The budget conforming bill (SB 2144) includes language that modifies staffing to lower the combined average weekly nursing and CNA staffing standard from 3.9 to 3.6 hours per patient day. The daily nursing standard of 1.0 hours per patient day remains unchanged, and the daily CNA staffing standard will be reduced from 2.7 to 2.5 hours per patient day.
The conforming bill also expands the Quality Assessment to the maximum federal allowance which will increase the total annual assessment from $349 million to $381 million, allowing most of the prior year rate cuts to be bought back.
To read more about how long term care fared in the 2011 legislative session, click here to read FHCA's 2011 Legislative Session Wrap-Up Report.
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