CMS to Add New Five-Star Quality Rating of
Nursing Homes to Compare Website
Nursing Home Compare continuing to add info to
help consumers make choices
June
19, 2008 - The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services today announced
it will soon launch a ground-breaking ranking system of America’s
nursing homes, giving each a “star” rating – one star up to five stars.
The ratings will be posted on the agency’s Nursing Home Compare Website
by the end of this year.
CMS is requesting comments on the system designed
to provide patients and their families an easy to understand assessment
of nursing home quality, making meaningful distinctions between high
performing and low performing homes.
Click here to post your comments online.
A sample screen shot of the proposed star ratings
is available by
clicking here.
Enables CMS to use Medicare Part D claims data for
research, program oversight and evaluation, care coordination, quality
improvement, and performance measurement initiatives
“More than three million Americans rely on
services provided by a nursing home at some point during the year. The
new “five-star” rating system will provide a composite view of the
quality and safety information currently on Nursing Home Compare to help
beneficiaries, their families, and caregivers compare nursing homes more
easily,” said Kerry Weems, CMS acting administrator.
Through its consumer information Web sites, CMS has
begun to offer more and better information on the quality, patient
satisfaction, and cost of care. Today’s announcement, for example,
closely follows the agency’s first nationwide identification of
chronically underperforming nursing homes. Facilities enrolled in the
Special Focus Facility (SFF) initiative are placed under special
scrutiny and undergo twice as many inspections as other homes.
The “SFF” designation was recently added to the
Nursing Home Compare Web site at
www.medicare.gov/NHCompare.
Last
year, CMS also initiated a star rating system for health and
prescription drug plans that are available to Medicare beneficiaries.
This will be the first time that CMS will offer
such a rating system for the fee-for-service, or traditional Medicare
program. Currently, through the Compare Web site, CMS assists
beneficiaries and their families in making nursing home choices by
providing information on individual measures of quality of care,
staffing, and survey inspection information.
“Nursing Home Compare’s new rating system will
also provide an incentive for nursing homes to strive toward earning a
five-star rating by providing an environment of better quality care,”
Weems said.
This new rating system is rooted in the tradition
of the OBRA’87 nursing home reform law and quality improvement campaigns
such as the Advancing Excellence in America’s Nursing Homes, a
collaborative coalition of consumers, health care providers, labor, and
nursing home professionals. CMS plans to work with other health care
providers and consumers to make similar rating systems available for
hospitals, home health agencies, and end-stage renal disease facilities
in the future.
The agency is also considering adding new
information to that already available on Nursing Home Compare such as
whether a nursing home specializes in caring for patients with dementia,
on ventilators, or in need of specialized rehabilitation services.
Information on patient and family satisfaction with services at a
facility may also be added to Nursing Home Compare.
A “Guide to Choosing a Nursing Home,” a publication
that includes information about the types of long-term care, local
nursing home comparisons, and how to pay for nursing home care, can also
be found on the site.
The five-star rating system will begin to be
published in December 2008. During June and July 2008 the agency is
soliciting ideas, comments, and suggestions from the public, consumer
groups, nursing homes, and many others. Comments may be sent to
BetterCare@cms.hhs.gov.
Descriptive information about the quality rating
system and its progress may be obtained after June 22, 2008 on the CMS
“Hot Topics” webpage –
click here.
This webpage will also provide details about a
national conference call (called an “open door forum”) that the agency
will have about the proposed five-star system on June 24, 2008.
“While Nursing Home Compare is very informative,
it is important to note that this should be just one of the tools that
family members and caregivers use in the selection of a nursing home,”
Weems said. “There is no substitute for visiting a nursing home in
person and meeting with staff, residents, and other families.”
Report Today on KaiserNetwork.org
Bush Administration Announces Quality Rating
System for Nursing Homes
CMS on Wednesday announced plans to implement by the end of the year
a five-star rating system to help consumers make more informed decisions
when they select nursing homes, the
AP/Detroit News reports (Freking, AP/Detroit News, 6/19).
CMS will base the ratings, which will appear on the
Medicare Web site, on government inspection results, staffing data and
19 quality measures. In addition, the ratings might include information
on whether nursing homes treat patients with dementia or those on
ventilators (Zhang,
Wall Street Journal, 6/19). According to CMS officials, the agency
will seek comments from the nursing home industry and consumers to
decide the specific criteria for the ratings (AP/Detroit Free Press,
6/19).
Acting CMS Administrator Kerry Weems said, "We know
the public is hungry for information," adding, "Transparent information
is an effective incentive for quality" (Cooley,
CQ HealthBeat, 6/18). Lower ratings "will likely put" nursing homes
"on the path to improvement," Weems said. "I don't think we're going to
see many people who are very anxious to put a loved one in a one-star
home," he added (AP/Detroit News, 6/19).
Comments
John Rother, executive vice president of
AARP, said, "The star rating system proposed today could make it
easier for families to identify facilities that consistently provide
quality service and safety for their residents."
Lauren Shaham, a spokesperson for the
American Association of Homes and Services for the Aging, said, "We
hope that a rating system would improve the quality of nursing homes'
care, but we are concerned that in the time-frame that CMS has outlined
they're not going to be able to build a stable, solid house to do that."
AAHSA President and CEO Larry Minnix said that CMS should base ratings
on "four essential pillars": patient and family satisfaction; staff
satisfaction; clinical quality outcomes; and public oversight (CQ
HealthBeat, 6/19).
American Health Care Association President Bruce Yarwood said that
CMS should not use government inspection results as the only criteria
for the ratings and should consider consumer and staff satisfaction. He
said, "We do not believe that an index which relies on a broken survey
system is an accurate way to measure quality" (AP/Detroit News, 6/19).
Toby Edelman, senior policy attorney with the
Center for Medicare Advocacy, said that two of three criteria CMS
plans to use for the ratings -- staffing data and quality measures --
are "self-reported by nursing facilities and are inaccurate." He said,
"Relying on nursing homes to describe accurately how well they are doing
... just doesn't make sense" (Wall Street Journal, 6/19).
June
19, 2008 - The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services today announced
it will soon launch a ground-breaking ranking system of America’s
nursing homes, giving each a “star” rating – one star up to five stars.
The ratings will be posted on the agency’s Nursing Home Compare Website
by the end of this year.
Money to state programs is part of $50 million
commitment for 2008