Yesterday, Tom Lavallee, Mass Senior Care’s Board Chair and COO of Alliance Health Management, threw out the ceremonial first pitch at Polar Park in Worcester. The LTC Appreciation Night at the Worcester Red Sox game was hosted by ProCare LTC Pharmacy, a Mass Senior Care Associate Member. The great event was attended by over 100 long term care leaders and professionals across the State.

Mass Senior Care would like to remind nursing facilities that the use of face masks for source control is still required by the DPH regulation. The updates to the DPH Guidance for Caring for Residents during the COVID-19 Response includes the following:

Brighten A Day Foundation is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit which lifts the spirits of nursing facility and assisted living residents by sending them love, hope, and joy through cards, letters, gifts, conversations, video messages, devices, care packages, and more. During her freshman year of high school, Hita Gupta started Brighten A Day which has now grown into a national organization with thousands of volunteers of all ages from locations across the country. To date, Brighten A Day has brought smiles to

Meet Seana Hall who is one of the 45,000 dedicated caregivers providing care and vital companionship to the Commonwealth’s nursing home residents. Seana has recently been promoted from Activities Director to Director of Admissions at Briarwood Rehabilitation and Healthcare Center in Needham. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Seana implemented creative activities to ensure residents living at Briarwood had a sense of normalcy and stayed connected with their family members and loved ones, including dance parties, bingo in the hallway, and a

The new AHRQ Toolkit to Improve Antibiotic Use in Long-Term Care offers a step-by-step approach to help facilities start or revitalize an antibiotic stewardship program. Using the Four Moments of Antibiotic Decision Making, facilities can identify critical time periods to help prescribers make decisions about antibiotic therapy.

Fully vaccinated Massachusetts residents can register to win cash prizes or college scholarships in the state’s VaxMillions Giveaway starting on Thursday, July 1st. Fully vaccinated Massachusetts residents who are 18 and older can enter the giveaway to win one of five $1 million cash prizes, and residents ages 12-17 can enter to win one of five $300,000 college scholarships in the form of a 529 college savings plan, per the giveaway rules. To promote the Mass VaxMillions Giveaway in your facility, download a promotional flyer which you can print and post in your facility.

For the first time in 50 years the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) released Emergency Temporary Standards (ETS) to address exposure to COVID-19 to workers in health care settings. Although temporary, the standard will be enforced effective July 6, 2021, and fully enforced on July 21, 2021.

In honor of National Nursing Assistant Week on June 17-24, Rose Marie Pardo, resident at Hancock Park Rehabilitation & Nursing Center in Quincy, calls for legislation and funding to pay CNAs a living wage. Her op-ed, CNAs are heroes: It’s time to pay them a living wage, was published in The Patriot Ledger last week.

The Baker Administration today announced that effective July 1st the weekly COVID-19 Public Health Report will be discontinued, and MassHealth issued a reminder that it is in the process of making numerous patient paid amount (PPA) adjustments for the period April 1, 2020 through November 30, 2020 for MassHealth members and requested that facilities do not make any changes to a MassHealth member’s PPA until you receive a Notice of Financial Liability (NFL) notice.