The pandemic may be easing, but the storm isn’t over for nursing homes. Financial pressures, staffing challenges, and other issues continue to plague providers and threaten the future for some. Among the comments and predictions from some industry leaders at the LeadingAge annual conference in Denver this week:
- Nursing homes may become ‘loss leaders’ given the inadequate Medicaid support in a number of states. This already has caused some providers to get out of the group home business.
- Many providers say that the challenges of what they’re dealing with now in terms of staffing, reimbursement, and other issues rival COVID in terms of the difficulty in responding.
- Occupancy is down because there aren’t enough staff to take care of residents; this is causing a greater financial strain on providers who hare forced to use staffing agencies.
- Addressing the staffing shortage continues to be the topic challenge for providers, and they see immigration as one possible solution.
- As a likely staffing mandate looms, many providers expect things to get worse before they get better.
