The Executive Office of Health and Human Services (EOHHS) yesterday issued a Notice of Proposed Agency Action to implement the FY 2020 Medicaid rate regulation. As noted in Mass Senior Care Association’s communication to members, the regulation would increase Medicaid funding by $53 million, including implementation of the FY 2020 budget act provisions for broad-based funding and targeted funding.

Please join Mass Senior Care, NALCO Water, An Ecolab Company and the Department of Public Health on October 31, 2019 for a webinar on Legionnaires’ disease, a serious, potentially deadly form of bacterial pneumonia. This webinar will focus on the public health risk of Legionnaires’ disease (LD), approaches to preventing outbreaks, and the CMS water management plan requirements.

Mass Senior Care invites staff at member facilities to participate in various committees designed to share information on the topics of clinical quality, regulatory, human resources and finance and reimbursement. Please see our upcoming October meetings.

This is a reminder that after September 27, 2019 at 3PM, you will no longer be able to check the Nurse Aide Registry using the current phone verification system. Beginning on Monday, September 30, the only way to check the Registry will be through the new online system. The Massachusetts Department of Public Health’s (DPH) Nurse Aide Registry Services (NARS) is transitioning from the current Interactive Voice Response (IVR) phone verification system to a new online inquiry system for verification

On Wednesday, the Department of Public Health approved a 3-year extension for nursing homes to comply with the CARES Act requirement that prescriptions be issued on a federally-compliant, secure system. The requirement was scheduled to take effect on January 1, 2019.

Olanda Molina dreamed of becoming a nurse when she started her career in long term care 15 years ago working in the laundry department. Shortly after that, Olanda became a Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) at Oak Knoll Health Care Center in Framingham.