Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius recently announced the availability of $27 million to help older individuals with chronic conditions to improve their health and reduce their use of costly medical care.These funds are made possible through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which has provided up to $650 million to HHS [...]

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A new Eljay LLC analysis of the nation’s Medicaid financing system projecting states will cumulatively under fund the actual cost of providing quality long term care by nearly $4.7 billion for 2009, and finds seniors in the states of New York, Illinois, Ohio, Texas, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Florida, California and Wisconsin will bear the [...]

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The Nattional Alliance for Caregiving released its annual report that profiles caregivers in the United States today to a similar report released five years ago.  The study examined the prevalence of caregivers in the U.S.(29% of the U.S. adult population, or 65.7 million people), the caregiving situation in terms of the nature of caregiving activities, [...]

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As the debate for health care reform and its affect on Medicare, Time Magazine ran a good article entitled, “Medicare Savings: Is the Answer in Mexico?” that discusses the massive differential in the costs of health care between Mexico and the US.  The article profiles some of the efforts of Americans for Medicare in Mexico, [...]

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The National Center for Assisted Living (NCAL) recently released a comprehensive report entitled “State Medicaid Reimbursement Policies and Practices in Assisted Living,” that details the wide variation in how states determine Medicaid payment levels for assisted living communities and other related policy issues.  The findings reveal that the number of people receiving Medicaid coverage in [...]

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For the first time since 1975, more than 57 million Americans will not automatically get a Cost-of-Living Adjustment (COLA) for monthly Social Security and Supplemental Security Income benefits for increase for 2010.  The Social Security Act provides that Social Security and Supplemental Security Income benefits increase automatically each year if there is an increase in [...]

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Sun Healthcare Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: SUNH) announced that its subsidiary, SolAmor Hospice Corporation, has completed the acquisition of Allegiance Hospice Group, Inc. Allegiance is a privately-held, Medicare-certified hospice company headquartered in Lowell, Mass. that provides services to approximately 300 hospice patients in Maine, Massachusetts and New Hampshire.  The transaction extends SolAmor Hospice’s footprint eight states [...]

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Last week Senators Herb Kohl (D-WI) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) released a report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) on the Special Focus Facility (SFF) Program, which monitors nursing homes that earn the worst quality ratings. The study recommends that the SFF program, administered by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), be [...]

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The New York Times ran an article entitled “Helping Elderly Leave Nursing Homes for a Home” that provided a positive review of the Money Follows the Person (MFP) concept.  The concept is a federal initiative to help states reduce their reliance on institutional care for people needing long-term care, and expand options for elderly people [...]

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As part of last week’s address to the nation on healthcare reform, President Obama identified that the costs of fraud associated with healthcare are a huge contributing factor to the rising cost of care.  Prior to the address and over the last few weeks, law enforcement officials that include the FBI, HUD and the SEC, [...]

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Last month, the 2009 AAHSA Ziegler 100 was released providing a snapshot of the 100 largest Not-For-Profit Senior Living organizations.  The report presents a variety of data metrics that show the size of the of the not-for-profit segment of the senior living sector and outlines characteristics of growing systems and overall trends of system growth.  [...]

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With Congress back in session this week, federal lawmakers are getting back to work on health care reform and examining how to finance the changes.  In a recent survey by the Mellman Group, the study finds that Americans, by significant margins, strongly oppose cutting Medicare-funded nursing home care over other funding options. Underscoring the unpopularity [...]

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