The impact of COVID-19 pandemic in nursing homes
The Nursing Home industry as we know has changed forever. In 2019 with the Coronavirus Pandemic, it changed the way we operate, manage, and think. The pandemic revealed many of us had our guard down and was not prepared. In the first part of the pandemic, every provider was doing their best given what we had. It was a time when we saw communities and staff come together. Nursing homes who often had been a closed competitive market, were working together to make sure everyone was taken care of and or educating, sharing what we learned. In this article we will break down what this great industry has overcome.
To start, we reviewed : The Government Accountability Office (GAO) report, “COVID-19 in Nursing Homes" Most Homes Had Multiple Outbreaks and Weeks of Sustained Transmission from May 2020 through January 2021. As the title suggest, most nursing homes faced multiple outbreaks. In this report the outbreak will be broken down by short-term and long-term duration. For that purposes, it is noted a short-term outbreak to last 1-4 weeks, while a long-term outbreak last over 5 weeks.
The GAO reported to have reviewed a total of 13,380 Medicare and Medicaid nursing homes in the United States, with only 64 of those nursing homes not having an outbreak as of January 2021. In looking on the other end of the scale, 6,000 nursing homes in the review had 4 or more outbreaks. This left the average of abut 3 outbreaks with most nursing homes, with many experiencing more than one. GAO found that about 85% had outbreaks lasting 5 weeks or more. To review further, the average number of COVID-19 cases per outbreak was 56 for long- term outbreaks. In comparison of the 15% of where outbreaks lasted 1-4 weeks, they showed an average of cases being 13. The government report did prove this virus shows no favoritism in not being selective. There was no variance or correlation identified between facility types.
In tracing the outbreaks, we learned that 66% of nursing homes reported the outbreak started by an employee testing positive. The importance here is to see the virus typically surfaced through staff or visitors. Therefore, the facility has such great responsibility to protect our elders by follow state, federal, and CDC guidelines, including but not limited to screening everyone going in and out of the facility.
To conclude, just as the Nursing Home industry felt great changed with the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation ACT of 1987, overcoming hurdles and challenges with new regulation, we too will overcome this. Just like that era, it dramatically improved the care and operations for nursing homes. I am hopeful that the CARES Act will also lead to great improvements in our infection control practices and growth in what we know about this virus.
