UPDATE Weekly

Make plans today to attend the sixth annual NCHCFA Summer Symposium August 9-11, 2017, at the Embassy Suites Resort at Kingston Plantation, Myrtle Beach, SC. Cindy Deporter, MSSW, State Agency Director, Assistant Section Chief Acute and Home Care Section, and Quality Evaluative Systems Manager, Nursing Home Licensure and Certification, DHSR, will present on Wednesday, August 9th at 1:00 PM. Topics to date include:

• New Interpretative Guidelines
• What to expect in November 2017
• New survey process

The content of this presentation will continue to be updated until August. Additional details will be available in June. You do not want to miss this informative program.

Ms. Deporter was appointed as Interim Assistant Section Chief of the Acute Home Care Section in July of 2013, overseeing approximately 2000 home care agencies, 269 certified home health care agencies, and 200 Hospice Agencies in North Carolina. She is also Branch Manager of Quality Evaluative Systems at DHSR. This section is responsible for Informal Dispute Resolution (IDR), Independent Informal Dispute Resolution (IIDR), Enhancement Coalition, Enhancement Grants, Civil Money Penalties (CMP), and the Quality Improvement Committee. Ms. Deporter also directs Quality Indicator Surveys (QIS), and leads Electronic Plans of Correction (ePOC) that are being implemented by CMS.

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Make plans today to join your colleagues for the sixth annual NCHCFA Summer Symposium. The three-day event will be August 9-11, 2017 at the Embassy Suites Resort at Kingston Plantation, Myrtle Beach, SC. Call the Embassy Suites Resort at (800) 876-0010 to reserve your overnight room. Use group code “HCA” to identify yourself as a NC Health Care Facilities Association Convention attendee! To make your reservation on-line, visit http://tinyurl.com/summersymposium2017.

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Key Healthcare providers, including nursing facilities, must be compliant with the new Emergency Preparedness standards by November 17, 2017. The CapRAC Healthcare Preparedness Coalition has a training opportunity on the new CMS emergency preparedness requirements. The training will be held on June 6th at 1:00 PM in Garner, NC. This afternoon session is oriented towards a variety of providers including nursing facilities. Seating is limited and is available to providers across the state.

Click here for additional information and a registration link.

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NCHCFA Districts have scheduled their spring meetings. The agenda will include the following topics/presentations:

Alliant Quality (QIN-QIO) – Alliant Quality will present an update on NC’s facilities’ quality measures including pressure ulcers, restraints, etc. They will also discuss the facility composite score.
Healthcare Preparedness Coalition – The Coalition will provide a brief presentation covering the CMS Emergency Preparedness Rule, to be implemented by November 2017, basic information regarding key considerations that challenge providers, and differences between urban and rural provider issues will also be discussed.
NC Culture Change Coalition – The Coalition is involved in several activities, including a grant program with the North Carolina Division of Health Service Regulation (DHSR). Information will be presented concerning how to apply for grants, the application process, eligible projects, and more.
NC Works – NC Works will present information on how NC Works may assist facilities in filling positions and keeping employees and how facilities can become more involved with NC Works.

District III
Clapp’s Convalescent Nursing Home
500 Mountain Top Drive
Asheboro, NC 27203
May 16, 2017
10:00 AM – 2:30 PM
To register, click here

District V
Universal Health Care / Fuquay-Varina
410 Judd Parkway
Fuquay-Varina, NC 27526
May 23, 2017
10:00 AM – 2:30 PM
To register, click here

District meetings allow participants to interact with peers in a comfortable atmosphere, promoting valuable and productive conversation. Space will be limited to 50 individuals but, unlike the previous district meetings, this will be open to any employees of your facility who may benefit from attending. There is no cost to participate.

These programs will offer 3.5 contact hours for nursing home administrators. The North Carolina Health Care Facilities Association is a Registered Sponsor of continuing education with the NC State Board of Examiners for Nursing Home Administrators. Comments regarding the Registered Sponsor Course may be addressed to: NCBENHA, 3733 National Drive, Suite 110, Raleigh, NC 27612.

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Alliant Quality wants to encourage SNFs to keep signing up for the National Collaborative – or SPACE. Alliant recommends having as much time as possible to get started on Quality Assurance Performance Improvement (QAPI) work and improving facility quality measures in a systems approach to improve their five star and composite scores.

Alliant Quality is the Medicare Quality Innovation Network (QIN)-Quality Improvement Organization (QIO) for North Carolina. Under contract with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), Alliant Quality invites your nursing home to participate in a collaborative designed to ensure that every nursing home resident receives the highest quality of care.

The Collaborative offers an exciting opportunity to learn from high performing nursing homes regarding their processes as they pertain to consistent/permanent staff assignment, teamwork and communications, leadership, regulatory compliance, clinical models, and quality of life indicators. The Collaborative aligns national nursing home quality initiatives and partnerships such as the Advancing Excellence in America’s Nursing Homes Campaign, The Partnership to Improve Dementia Care, and QAPI. Targeted focus areas will include increasing mobility, decreasing unnecessary use of antipsychotics in residents with dementia, decreasing potentially avoidable hospitalizations and decreasing healthcare acquired infections and conditions.

When ready to register, click here for the Participation Agreement and fax or e-mail it back to Lisa Klemis, contact information is on the Participation Agreement. For more details, e-mail Leighann Sauls at Leighann.Sauls@area-F.hcqis.org or call (919) 745-4730.

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The updated List of Excluded Individuals and Entities (LEIE) database file, which reflects all OIG exclusions and reinstatement actions up to, and including, those taken in April 2017 has been posted. The updated files are posted on OIG’s Web site at http://www.oig.hhs.gov/exclusions/exclusions_list.asp, and healthcare providers have an “affirmative duty” to check to ensure that excluded individuals are not working in their facilities or face significant fines.

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A Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF) Webcast will be held on June 28, 2017, at 10 AM ET. This Webcast will cover an overview of Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF) Consolidated Billing information. During this call, Palmetto GBA will review inclusions/exclusions; any new SNF updates as well as SNF paid claim error rates and top SNF denial reason codes. If you are a skilled nursing facility provider, please consider participating on this informative Webcast.

To register for this event, click here.

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Alliant Quality, the QIN-QIO (Quality Innovation Network-Quality Improvement Organization) for North Carolina is seeking central North Carolina skilled nursing facilities interested in collaborating on the Special Innovation Project (SIP) Improving Access to Palliative Care in the Long Term Care Facility.

Palliative care focuses on comfort and improving quality of life. A team of professionals helps residents and families navigate through the health care system and make health care decisions that are right for them. Goals of this project not only include providing quality of life and satisfaction for residents of skilled nursing facilities (SNFs), but also provision of services that minimize risks of potentially avoidable transfers to acute care.

Often, nursing home residents lack advance directives that would assist them at the end of life. When a resident, without an advanced directive, suffers a worsening of their clinical condition, a cascade of care is put into motion and can trigger unwanted emergency room visits and admissions, which can lead to other complications. The provision of palliative care services for SNF residents supports person-directed care in a proactive way to honor the patient and their choices.

Alliant Quality, in partnership with SNFs and palliative care organizations, will develop customized education and learning sessions for SNF leaders to better understand palliative care and its beneficial role for the residents whom they are caring for each day. This educational offering will be pilot-tested in central North Carolina with SNFs who are interested in this Special Innovation Project offered through the Centers for Medicaid & Medicare Services.

Participating SNFs will have the opportunity to:

• Receive free training programs designed to improve their SNF staff competency and knowledge related to end-of-life care
• Join a learning network with experts on palliative care in the SNF setting
• Partner with palliative care providers in order to improve the quality of life of their residents
• Implement low-burden measurement strategies that monitor resident and family satisfaction with end-of-life care
• Improve rates of avoidable acute care transfers and hospital admission and readmission rates

For more information, contact:
Jennifer Judson RN, BSN
Project Lead, Palliative Care
Office: (678) 527-3473
Jennifer.Judson@alliantquality.org

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It’s here and it’s hot! This year’s AHCA/NCAL Convention & Expo Preliminary Program is now available on-line! You can even read it on your mobile devices. Take a look at what Las Vegas has in store for you October 15th-18th, 2017 in this easy-to-access, easy-to-read flip book.

This year’s Convention & Expo offers national keynote speakers, valuable education, professional networking and exciting exhibits staffed with experts ready to help your company excel. The Gala Dinner & Show (separate ticketed event) is going to be a fantastic night of music, food, and fun that you will remember long after the Las Vegas night ends with Huey Lewis and the News headlining!

Register early and save! Early bird registration and savings continue through July 21st.

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This newly updated and revised book presents ready-to-use materials for planning, implementing, and evaluating cultural competence strategies and programs. Learn to identify the needs of diverse constituents, evaluate outcomes, prevent multicultural-related workplace conflict, and much more. Includes tools to evaluate and assess cultural competence on a companion Web site.

To order, visit http://www.AHCApublications.org or call (800) 321-0343. Fax orders may also be placed at (800) 869-5605.

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This brochure outlines what physical restraints are, when they should be used, rules and regulations concerning restraints, and making decisions about using them. To order, e-mail your request to Donna Snyder at donnas@nchcfa.org.

• NCHCFA Member: $30.00 per 100 brochures plus tax and shipping
• Non-Members: $60.00 per 100 brochures plus tax and shipping

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Building A QAPI Team To Find Root Causes

http://www.providermagazine.com/columns/Pages/2017/Building-A-QAPI-Team-To-Find-Root-Causes.aspx

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On Kentucky Derby Day the infield holds around 80,000 revelers, making it Kentucky’s third-largest city, behind Lexington and Louisville.

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