![]() Bridging the nurse staff generation gap with mentoring.Providing flexible training and support.But by taking a few steps, you can turn the tide on your nursing professional retention and recruitment, stabilizing and improving your CMS star ratings. Suboptimal scheduling practices can be a significant contributing factor to fatigue and burnout, leading to poor work-life balance and your staff feeling that they lack control in their work experiences. This is exactly why examining your scheduling practices should be front and center of your CMS Star Rating tactics. It can mean a loss of knowledge and understanding that cannot easily be replaced. Losing nursing professionals is more than just a few unfilled shifts. Take this as an opportunity to review your history with reporting, clarifying issues like reporting hours for feeding assistants or hospice staff, and how administrator hours should be reported. The result will be one star in the staffing domain and drop your composite score by an entire star for the quarter. For example, if a nursing home’s audit identifies a conflict between hours worked and hours verified, or if you fail to submit data by the required deadline, it will be assumed that you have low levels of staffing. Today, audits that reveal significant inaccuracies can cause setbacks in attaining your star goals. In the past, some facilities have incorrectly provided staffing information on CMS form 671, reaching beyond the certified facility to include staff that shouldn’t be counted. Reporting is the foundation of CMS’ perspective on your staffing practices. The lesson? Improving your CMS star rating is a journey that will involve slow and continuous integration of the lessons you learn-iterating instead of taking one-off actions. Work incrementallyĬigna gradually improved its medication delivery system with a focus on long-term success. ![]() ![]() While the process is different for providers, listening to your nurses and patients can go a long way in addressing opportunities and problem spots in your staffing strategy. Listen and communicateĬigna stepped out to communicate and listen to their beneficiaries, using their advice to inform decision-making year over year. If your Star Rating improvement goal doesn’t have an owner, you might benefit from identifying one. For example, their “Vice President of Stars” cited excitement at earning stars across the board. Create accountabilityįive-star rated Cigna HealthSpring of Florida boasts the highest award from CMS, and it’s likely in part to their having titles responsible for their star ratings. But a recent winner of the top rating is sharing advice that can be easily translated to post-acute staffing practices. Insurance plans work under a somewhat similar system, where five-star status is rare. Providers aren’t the only ones looking to CMS for better star ratings. If there isn’t someone on your team who currently owns CMS updates and making suggested adjustments to your staffing strategy, now is an excellent time to delegate that responsibility and establish a schedule. This move was born out of an understanding of the connection between staffing levels and the quality of care for residents-so expect adjustments and additional announcements around staffing and the Star Rating system in the future. For example, in mid 2022, CMS enhanced its Nursing Home Five-Star Quality Rating System, integrating data from nursing homes on weekend staffing rates and annual turnover for administrators and nurses. Create a Best Practice of Using Updates to Inform Your Staffing Strategyįirst, make sure you’re on top of the most recent changes to star rating requirements. That area of focus is staffing.īy turning your staffing strategy into one that supports achieving a CMS 5 Star Rating, you can keep your promise of quality care to your patients and families while reducing turnover and improving the experience for your nursing professionals. Regardless of where you’re starting, you have multiple options to inch that score even higher, but there is one area of focus that can enhance the experience of your residents while improving your standing with CMS. This means increased pressure on administrators to get as close as possible to a CMS 5 Star Rating. ![]() Nursing home performance is gaining increasing influence on your reimbursement and compliance.
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