The House of Representatives earlier this week enacted an omnibus health care reform bill. The final bill includes three nursing home provisions that Mass Senior Care supported in order to preserve access to long and short term care. Creation of an Emergency Task Force on the Financial Conditions and Future of Massachusetts Nursing Home Care – the emergency task force, of which Mass Senior Care would be a member, would be required to evaluate options and make policy recommendations necessary

Twenty-eight Mass Senior Care member facilities are being recognized with a 2018 Bronze - Commitment to Quality Award by AHCA/NCAL.

AHCA recently received clarification from CMS on S&C Memo: 17-30 Requirement to Reduce Legionella Risk in Healthcare Facility Water Systems to Prevent Cases and Outbreaks of Legionnaires’ Disease (LD). CMS has clarified that testing for Legionella or other waterborne pathogens are not required, unless it is required by the state. Facilities must have a water management plan to assess the risk of pathogens and have testing protocols in place.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is holding a webinar on Tuesday, June 19th at 1:00pm ET on Emergency Preparedness for Providers. The national webinar will address topics and questions related to the new CMS Emergency Preparedness Rule, the 1135 waiver and Lessons Learned (observations) within the past year. Register for the webinar here.

In the past weeks, several members have noted unusual outputs from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Patient-Driven Payment Model (PDPM) tools. Since then, AHCA has been in contact with CMS and CMS has updated several tools to correct errors. Please click here to read the complete summary from AHCA.

We are saddened to share that on June 6 th, Alfred "Doc" Arcidi passed away at the age of 86. A graduate of Merrimack College, Dr. Arcidi earned his Doctorate of Dental Science from the University of Buffalo School of Dentistry and developed a large family dentistry practice in Lawrence. In 1982, Dr. Arcidi founded the Whittier Health Network, a highly successful healthcare organization consisting of multiple facilities spread throughout Massachusetts as well as Eastern New York. Phil Arcidi, one

Four residents recently celebrated their 100 thplus birthdays at Hathaway Manor Extended Care Facility in New Bedford. Among those joining the birthday celebration was Wanda Hardy, Activities Director and New Bedford Mayor John Mitchell. It was Diamond and Denim Day for Virginia Brackman, 100, Juliette Higham, 103, Lois Vanorski, 101, and Mary Ferreira 100. (Pictured Below)

AHCA contracted with a law firm to develop a toolkit to support members creating a compliance and ethics program by November 28, 2019 for Phase 3 of the Requirements of Participation. Members must log into ahcancalED to access the resource. This toolkit is a concise summary of the requirements with helpful, practical tips for implementation. It also pulls in best practices from a variety of sources to support providers in building or improving their program. Creating an effective program requires

Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF) Provider Preview Reports are now available; visit the Spotlights and Announcements webpage for a list of quality measures based on quarterly data. Review your performance data by June 30, prior to public display on Nursing Home Compare. Corrections to the underlying data will not be permitted during this time; request a CMS review if you believe that your data is inaccurate.