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Byline: Ross Barkan Congestion pricing isn't the only worthy idea that's now dead in Albany. An effort to set up a commission with subpoena power to examine New York's response [...]

Hospitals and other healthcare organizations are increasingly turning to subacute care as a means of filling empty beds and increasing revenues, but the practice cannot solve all providers' problems. The Health Care Financing Administration, state regulators, patient groups and others are carefully examining subacute care. The HCFA wants to make sure that the practice is not designed solely to generate higher Medicare reimbursement rates.

Providers of all kinds are becoming involved in the subacute care market because it is needed by a wide variety of patients, is cost-effective for long-term care and meets the demands of third-party payers. Subacute care is appropriate for patients who do not need acute-care services but do need more care than is available at home or in a nursing facility. Many hospitals have added subacute care units, and more are expected to follow. Also, several large nursing home chain now include subacute care among their services. Some specific entrants in the market and their strategies are discussed

Nursing facilities are developing more special care units for Alzheimer's disease patients in response to growing numbers of senior citizens afflicted with dementia-related disorders. Special care units provide long-term care for Alzheimer's patients and employ specially trained nursing staff and consultants familiar with the disease. Nursing facilities are also generating revenues from the special units, which are relatively inexpensive to build and operate.

Byline: Andis Robeznieks As more payers appear poised to reimburse providers for the care-coordination services provided under the patient-centered medical home model, other players are stepping up their medical home [...]

Byline: Neil Mclaughlin Notes on the news: It's a sign of the times that someone has built a novel about the failings of the U.S. healthcare system. The recently published [...]

Byline: Jessica Zigmond For long-term-care providers, changing the culture in nursing homes can also mean changing an operation's bottom line. While the term "culture change is hardly new for the [...]

Rivington House, a 206-bed skilled-nursing facility in New York for people living with HIV/AIDS, introduced a leadership training institute in 2006 to boost lagging job satisfaction among employees. To provide [...]

Fifty-four nursing homes in 34 states and the District of Columbia have made the federal government's "worst of'' list, with 19 states having unsafe facilities on the list for almost [...]

the traditional clients of nursing homes--elderly, long-term residents--are increasingly finding that they have young neighbors. The more youthful residents may be there for extended periods because of severe brain injury. [...]

American House is offering condominium sales as an option for residents in selected senior living centers. American House Senior Living Residences in Southfield, Dearborn Heights, Westland, Farmington Hills, Rochester Hills, [...]

Byline: Joseph Mantone Nursing home providers are welcoming the idea of linking federal payments to quality performance, but some consumer advocates wonder why nursing homes need to be rewarded for [...]

A stay at the Lutheran Augustana Center for Extended Care and Rehabilitation, a 240-bed nursing home in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, costs more than $100,000 a year. Sound pricey? The rate [...]

Byline: Joseph Mantone Rising costs for private-pay nursing home residents can be partly attributed to increased competition for residents from other types of facilities, industry experts said. Nursing home residents [...]

A pilot program that American House Senior Living Residences helped pioneer allows low-income seniors to combine two government benefits to pay monthly rent and service fees. The program, called Affordable [...]

Spending-quality link fuzzy Nursing home spending per resident has no clear relationship to quality of care, according to a study of three states by the General Accounting Office. The recent [...]

Last year, the Hebrew Home for the Aged got some new competition when an assisted-living facility catering to the affluent opened its doors down the street in Riverdale. This year, [...]

Meditrust Inc. Chmn Abraham Gosman forecasts that assisted-living industry revenues will increase to $22 billion in 2001 from the current $13 billion. All together, the senior housing industry accounts for $86 billion in revenues. Meditrust is the largest domestic real estate investment trust specializing in the healthcare industry with $3.3 billion in assets representing 500 healthcare facilities in 41 states. Meditrust made investments of over $377 million in assisted living in 1997., Healthcare mogul Abraham Gosman's definition of an investment banker is someone who gives entrepreneurs an umbrella when the sun is shining but takes it away when it starts to rain. [...]

Shore View Nursing Home in Brooklyn, NY, received a Marriott Service Excellence Award in the category of Patient Service for its Russian language program. The two-and-a-half year old program was designed to meet the needs of its Russian-speaking patient pool, which was increasing largely because of immigrants from the former Soviet Union. The number of Shore View's Russian-speaking staff members has risen from 3 to 65 since 1991.

At Fort Hudson Health Services Corp., in Fort Edward, N.Y., residents are calmed, stimulated and fascinated by an interactive sensory stimulation activity center, or ISSAC, which helps nursing home residents [...]

Several new facilities that will provide skilled-nursing care for AIDS patients are under development in the Los Angeles, CA, area. The not-for-profit AIDS Healthcare Foundation provides hospice care and operates several medical clinics. A Van Nuys, CA, nursing home chain, Country Villa, plans to convert a West Los Angeles nursing home to a 73-bed AIDS facility to be operated as a not-for-profit undertaking. Country Villa is investigating other similar ventures. Other investor groups may also fund facilities.

Nursing facilities, no longer 'warehouses for the elderly,' are playing a larger role in geriatric care. They are offering patient-centered care, in which patients take an active role. They are also expanding into subacute, outpatient and home-based elderly care. Decisive management, financial and regulatory actions are needed to complete the transformation of nursing facilities into multiservice, customer-driven providers.