With federal relief propping up nursing home operations during the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, the mergers-and-acquisitions market has remained relatively stable over the past year — but buyers and sellers are already starting to adjust to a world where the full licensed bed capacity is more of a pipe dream than a realistic benchmark. Amy Sitzman, […]
When the overhaul of Medicare Part A reimbursement for nursing homes took effect in October 2019, predictions of audits and the potential for drastic changes came close on its heels. After all, the Patient-Driven Payment Model (PDPM) was meant to be revenue-neutral, meaning that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) would not spend […]
California attorney general Xavier Becerra faced a range of questions in his confirmation hearing for the role of Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary — including whether or not he would support more government aid for nursing homes and other health care providers ravaged by the COVID-19 pandemic. Sen. Susan Collins, a Republican […]
The size and permanence of a COVID-era shift to home health has emerged as a top metric to watch in post-acute and long-term care in 2021. Should hospitals and patients continue to elect direct trips home even after the COVID-19 danger subsides, the natural trend could have far-reaching effects on the future of the nursing […]
Per-bed prices — a gold-standard valuation metric for buyers looking to invest in skilled nursing facilities — have remained stable for most of the COVID-19 pandemic, and even picked up at the end of 2020. But focusing on cash flow is perhaps even more important as the government shoots money into the industry. Bed prices […]
COVID-19 outbreaks in skilled nursing facilities are affected by more than geography, and nursing home operators have tools and actions they can take to mitigate the spread of the virus in their facilities, the Center for Medicare Advocacy (CMA) argued in a report released on Thursday. “Since the start of the pandemic, one of the […]
Over the course of 2020, as skilled nursing facilities battled the COVID-19 pandemic, the Patient-Driven Payment Model (PDPM) was one of the bright spots for operators, allowing them to secure payments for caring for the clinical needs of patients at a time when those needs grew markedly more complex. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid […]
The average U.S. nursing home has operated in a kind of survival mode for the last year, with long-term goals around new clinical and reimbursement models shoved aside to tackle the immediate and persistent scourge of COVID-19. That said, some facilities were still able to execute on previously developed strategies to enter the world of […]
Operators of skilled nursing facilities for years have dealt with the aging post-acute and long-term care infrastructure across the U.S., coping with problems ranging from multi-resident rooms to poor plumbing to outdated building design. During the COVID-19 pandemic, it became apparent that poor building design was more than a headache for cash-strapped operators; in the […]
Executives at CareTrust REIT (Nasdaq: CTRE) expect to see hospital referrals to skilled nursing facilities eventually return, with executives arguing that a recent spike in diversions to home health is unlikely to become permanent. Eventually, the referral destinations for post-acute patients are going to stop coming out so lopsidedly in home health’s favor, according to […]
Good infection control standards are the same for skilled nursing facilities across the U.S. — both in the sense of federally mandated requirements, and in the sense of the concrete conditions that are necessary to prevent the spread of contamination. This was true even before a pandemic that shook the world in 2020, with ongoing […]
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic trained an intense spotlight on the financing of nursing home operations and real estate in America, private equity investors in the sector found themselves under the microscope. Moving forward, the pandemic will likely have a double-barreled effect on PE interest in the space, with a more selective crop of companies […]
The majority of patients at any nursing facility have their care covered by the Medicaid program of any given state, and those rates are notorious for being insufficient to cover the cost of the services those patients demand — to the point that operators from multiple states can argue near-simultaneously that it is theirs with […]
With a change in presidential administration comes changes in policy, and skilled nursing facilities should expect a shift in the approach of the federal government to regulation. As the SNF sector emerges from the devastation of COVID-19, they are also going to receive significant oversight from the administration of Democratic President Joe Biden. And according […]
Against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, the federal government has left its new Medicare payment system for nursing homes virtually unchanged since the original rollout in October 2019 — but that doesn’t mean operators and investors should assume the status quo will last forever. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and its […]
As skilled nursing facilities roll up their sleeves at varying rates for the vaccine against COVID-19, their clinical situation amid the pandemic is improving rapidly, a turnaround from 2020 made almost fully complete with the distribution of vaccines. But the financial outlook, shaped by dismal occupancy numbers that show no signs of recovery, is becoming […]
Among the many long-standing issues that COVID-19 exposed in long-term care, the design of the facilities themselves stands as one of the most obvious. With new development of long-term care facilities almost nonexistent, nursing homes frequently rank as the oldest health care properties in their given markets. “Semi-private” rooms with up to four beds remain […]
When the effort to vaccinate long-term care workers and residents began to gather momentum, hesitancy among workers became a prominent issue well before the first shots were administered. The issue of whether or not workers — burned out by the ongoing tragedy of resident and staff deaths from COVID-19, personal protective equipment (PPE) shortages, and […]
Though vaccinations are speeding up in skilled nursing facilities across the country, visitation policies still rely on state and county guidance that hinges on the number of COVID-19 cases both in surrounding communities and inside nursing homes. In turn, states and other local authorities will likely look toward Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) […]
The COVID-19 pandemic brought an unrelenting spotlight to clinical care in skilled nursing facilities — one that will shine in the form of government audits and investigations before the immediate crisis ends and long after it passes. But several operators had trained their sights on clinical care within their facilities before the start of the […]
