News: Final rule introduces stricter nursing home staffing requirements
On April 22, 2024, CMS issued the Minimum Staffing Standards for Long-Term Care (LTC) Facilities and Medicaid Institutional Payment Transparency Reporting final rule, which includes stricter requirements regarding nursing home staffing. The final rule requires a total nurse staffing standard of 3.48 hours per resident per day for any facility receiving Medicare and Medicaid funding, as well as ratios for registered nurses (0.55 hours per resident per day) and nurse aides (2.45 hours per resident per day), Fierce Healthcare reported.
In the fact sheet release, CMS explained, “This means a facility with 100 residents would need at least two or three [registered nurses] and at least 10 or 11 nurse aides as well as two additional nurse staff (which could be registered nurses, licensed professional nurses or nurse aides) per shift to meet the minimum staffing standards.”
Such nursing homes are also required to have at least one registered nurse onsite 24 hours a day, develop a staffing plan to maximize recruitment and retention, and “conduct a stronger annual facility assessment than is currently required to improve the planning and identification of the resources and supports that are needed to care for residents based on their acuity during both day-to-day operations and emergencies,” The United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said in an accompanying press release.
CMS received more than 46,000 public comments on the rule when it was proposed in September, many of which spoke of poor care experiences due to understaffing of nursing homes, the fact sheet stated. The requirements will be introduced in phases, with rural communities receiving longer time frames to comply and temporary exemptions given to nursing homes that demonstrate a good faith effort to hire in areas with a workforce shortage. The administration will also be investing in training nursing and care workers, including a $75 million national nursing home staffing campaign, to support the effort.
Long-term care industry groups who opposed the rule proposal continue to argue that employers are struggling with a shortage of clinical workers and won’t be able to afford the number required.
Editor’s note: To read Fierce Healthcare’s coverage of this story, click here. To read CMS’ fact sheet for this final rule, click here.