Thank you to those who have been donating items to help the nursing home staff and their families affected by the recent tornado. Many are continuing to come to work, caring for our Elders while their own families are picking up the pieces of their lives. KHCA/kcal needs your help so we can offer our neighbors a hand. Donations will be presented on the week of June 6, 2011. Please considering helping in one of the ways listed below.

There are three different ways to help:
1. Monetary Donations
2. Health Kits
3. Snack Packs

Monetary Donations: All monetary donations will be placed in an account set up at the Envista Credit Union in Topeka. 100% of the donations will be used to assist nursing home and assisted living staff members and their family members affected by the storms.

Checks should be made payable to:
Neighborhood Missions
c/o KHCA/kcal
117 SW 6th Ave Suite 200
Topeka, KS 66604
Please contact Carol Anno for information about your tax deductible gift.

Health Kits - our goal is 1000 kits. The approximate cost of each kit is $5 - $10.
Contents of a Health Kit (List provided by UMCOR)
Place these new, unwashed items inside a sealed one-gallon plastic bag.
•1 hand towel 15” x 25” to 17”x 27”
•1 washcloth
•1 comb (needs to be sturdy and at least 8” long)
•1 metal nail file or clipper
•1 bath soap (3 oz. or larger) - leave in original packaging
•1 toothbrush (adult size only) - leave in original packaging
•6 adhesive bandages (¾” to 1“ common household band aids)
• toothpaste

Snack Packs - our goal is 1000 packs. The approximate cost of each pack is $5 - $10.
Place these nonperishable items inside a sealed one-gallon plastic bag.
* Wet nap in baggie
* Protein or fruit bar
* Canned meats and fruits with quick pull tab tops
* Pack of crackers
* Package of nuts
* Plastic spoon or fork

Other ways to help and volunteer:

General Assistance: 1-417-625-3543
Medical/Professional Volunteers: 1-417-832-9500
Animal Rescue Operations: 1-417-581-2414

KHCA/kcal District Vice Presidents will serve as coordinators for collecting these items. Please contact the person closest to your home for instructions. KHCA/kcal will coordinate the delivery of all items collected. Click HERE for the list of coordinators. KAHSA has joined in the efforts and have offered additional locations to drop off donations. Click HERE for the list of additional collection spots.

Thank you all for showing that while we are Caring for Seniors in the Heartland, we are also caring for neighbors next door.

May is certainly was a busy month! Between Nursing Home Week, graduations, end of school and the tragic severe weather, many of you had more than enough on your plate. With that in mind, we have extended the deadline for the staff and resident awards, which will be presented at the 61st Annual Convention. The new deadline is June 30, 2011. Don't miss this opportunity to recognize your staff and distinguished residents. Click here for a link to the staff award files (KHCA and kcal) and here for the Distinguished Citizen file.

 North Point Skilled Nursing & Rehab, skilled nursing by Americare, announced that the facility was deemed deficiency-free during its recent survey by the State of Kansas’s Department on Aging.    The survey is conducted annually and is a comprehensive review of the facility’s entire operation.

 “We are so pleased with our survey results,” comments Jennifer Fox, Administrator.  “We have a top-notch team of caregivers here and they know they do a great job.  Our recent resident and family satisfaction surveys confirmed our quality as well.  Receiving a deficiency-free survey from the state is no easy feat but this staff was up to the challenge. I’m so proud of the team here,” she adds.

 The survey examines quality issues relating to resident care, dietary, activities, housekeeping, life safety, and physical plant.  The survey team consists of three nurses, all RNs.  Results are based on record and chart reviews, resident and family interviews, and on-site observations. 

 North Point is a 59 bed skilled nursing facility located at 908 N. Pearl in Paola, KS.  The facility is owned and operated by Americare, a Sikeston-based long-term care provider with facilities throughout Missouri, Kansas, Tennessee, and Mississippi.

Amanda Yorkey, Education Consultant with the Kansas State Fire Marshal's Office, is hosting two trainings for maintenance staff in August, 2011. Click here for the complete flyer and registration information.

This class will be offer in two locations:  Salina (August 3rd) and Topeka (August 4th)

Questions? Contact:

Amanda Yorkey
Education Consultant
Kansas State Fire Marshal
785-296-0659
amanda.yorkey@ksfm.ks.gov

Take Action! Ask Your Representative to Sign the Latham-Neal Letter to CMS.
 

Please act today and ask your Representative to sign the Dear Colleague letter to Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) regarding proposed cuts to Medicare.
 
Representatives Tom Latham (R-IA) and Richard Neal (D-MA) are circulating a bipartisan letter to CMS Administrator Dr. Donald Berwick urging the agency to delay an exceptionally high proposed Medicare payment cut to skilled nursing facilities that is based upon limited data.
 
Action Needed: contact your Representative today and ask them to sign on to this letter. We must ensure that our nation’s seniors continue to have access to the critical health care services provided by skilled nursing facilities. This request is time-sensitive; sign on today.
 
Please click here to send a letter to your Representative.
 

For questions or additional guidance, please contact:
Matthew Smyth, Grassroots Director * 202.898.2817 * msmyth@ahca.org
American Health Care Association * 1201 L Street, NW * Washington, DC 20005 * www.ahca.org

The nation’s leading long term care organization, the American Health Care Association (AHCA) represents nearly 11,000 non-profit and proprietary facilities that offer skilled nursing, assisted living, sub-acute care, and homes for people with developmental disabilities. Our membership ranges from the small, independent-owner to regional and multi-facility chain corporations—each providing the kind of professional, compassionate long term care that millions of Americans will require at some point in their lives due to disability, illness, trauma, or social needs.
 

CMS is posting the revised Long-Term Care Facility Resident Assessment Instrument User's Manual Version 3.0 for the public on or close to June 2.  The download will be accessible at:
http://www.cms.gov/NursingHomeQualityInits/45_NHQIMDS30TrainingMaterials.asp#TopOfPage..

 
Please be advised of minor changes that have been made to the manual:
June 2, 2011 MDS 3.0 Training Materials Update:
MDS 3.0 RAI Manual V1.05 (June 2, 2011)
MDS 3.0 RAI Manual May 25, 2011 (a zip file contains 58 files)
•         
This zip file is the complete manual and contains all manual chapters / sections / appendices / title page / Table of Contents / forms (58 files). This includes change table files for the revised V1.05 files only.
Files containing revisions in this V1.05 release include: Title Page, Table of Contents, Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3 (Introduction, Sections: A, B, D, F, G, I, J, K, M, N, O, and Q), Chapter 5, Chapter 6 and Appendices (A, B, C, E, and H).
Note that files from earlier versions (e.g., V1.04 September 2010) are contained in the manual but do not have an associated change table file.
Please note that the month/year located at the bottom left on the manual pages reflects when that file was last updated (e.g., May 2011 for V1.05).
Archived Change Tables May 25, 2011 (a zip file contains 8 files) RAI MDS Coordinators May, 2011
 

AHCA’s Quality Improvement Committee is sponsoring two webinars on the Advancing Excellence Campaign.  The first is an overview of where we are today and the relationship to QA/PI (Quality Assurance/Performance Improvement).

June 9th – Part I. The Advancing Excellence Campaign: How the Campaign Tools and Resources will help Nursing Homes with Quality Assurance/Performance Improvement
 
Overview:
With more than 45% of the nation’s nursing homes participating, the Advancing Excellence in America's Nursing Home Campaign is a leading national resource for quality improvement tools and resources.  It is well positioned and is actively gearing up to help nursing homes prepare for QA/PI, the new Quality Assurance/Performance Improvement Program that will be mandated by CMS.  The first webinar will focus on what QA/PI is and how it differs from quality improvement programs that nursing homes have typically managed.  We will use realistic examples to show the difference between QA and PI and also show how to use Campaign tools and resources to help prepare for the new regulations.  After the webinar, participants will be able to begin evaluating their own programs and begin to make changes to ensure compliance.

Registration for June 9th  webinar  - http://webinars.ahcancal.org/session.php?id=6945

June 16 - Part II. Getting the Most Out of the Advancing Excellence Campaign Tools and Resources: Demonstration of How to Use the Campaign’s Tools and Resources

The Advancing Excellence in America's Nursing Home Campaign helps to make nursing homes better places to live, work and visit.  Quality Assurance and Performance Improvement (QA/PI) is all about improving important aspects of care including both organizational processes such as staff turnover and consistent assignment and pressure ulcers and symptoms of pain.  The Campaign has a series of data collection tools and interventions that will help nursing homes jumpstart QA/PI.  In this webinar, attendees will receive a detailed explanation and a demonstration of how to use the Campaign tools for the four topics that are listed in a successful performance improvement program. 

Registration for June 16th webinar - http://webinars.ahcancal.org/session.php?id=6946

Bringing a wealth of experience in improving quality in long-term care, Dr. Cheryl Phillips and Dr. David Gifford were recently named co-chairs of the Advancing Excellence in America’s Nursing Homes Campaign (Advancing Excellence). The two were elected co-chairs by the Advancing Excellence in Long Term Care Collaborative Board. Their term is for two years, beginning January 1, 2012.

“On behalf of the Advancing Excellence and the Collaborative Board, we welcome the opportunity to work with Dr. Gifford and Dr. Phillips in their new roles,” stated Mary Jane Koren, MD, MPH, current chair of the collaborative board. “Advancing Excellence has a wide membership full of innovative ideas and deep knowledge about how to promote nursing home quality. Dr. Phillips and Dr. Gifford are well suited to ensure that the strides we have made will continue.”

The mission of Advancing Excellence is to help nursing homes become better places to live, work and visit. The Campaign does this by supporting statewide LANEs or Local Area Networks of Excellence. The LANEs focus nursing homes on problem areas that the public cares about such as improved organizational workplace practices and clinical outcomes. The Campaign also provides nursing homes free and evidence-based technical assistance tools to accomplish improvement in the selected areas. 

Advancing Excellence works closely with other national nursing home quality initiatives to streamline efforts and maximize improvement. With 46% of all nursing homes in America taking part in the campaign since its establishment in 2006, there has been measurable progress in many significant quality improvement areas.  The number of pressure ulcers and daily use of physical restraints have both decreased. In addition, the use of consistent assignment – the same person taking care of the same resident day after day – has also increased.

“Advancing Excellence offers nursing homes a unique opportunity to set goals for improvement, measure that improvement and access numerous resources to help meet the goals,” said Dr. Cheryl Phillips. “I am honored to serve such an important initiative and look forward to working with Dr. Gifford and the entire collaborative board to make this unique partnership even more effective.”

Dr. Phillips serves as LeadingAge’s senior vice president for advocacy. Previously, she served as chief medical officer for On Lok Lifeways, the country’s first Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) program.  She also serves as chair of the board of directors and immediate past president of the American Geriatrics Society and is also past president of the American Medical Directors Association, the physician organization for long-term care.

“I am honored to serve with Dr. Phillips to chair the Advancing Excellence board ” stated Dr. Gifford. “The Advancing Excellence Campaign is a groundbreaking collaboration between patient advocacy organizations, long term care providers, health care professionals, and government agencies that are dedicated to helping all nursing homes achieving excellence in the quality of care and quality of life for the millions of elderly living in nursing homes throughout our country.”

Dr. Gifford is the Senior Vice President of Quality and Regulatory Affairs at the American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living (AHCA/NCAL).  Previously, Dr. Gifford served as the director of the Rhode Island State Department of Health and was the chief medical officer for Quality Partners of Rhode Island where he directed the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ national nursing home-based quality improvement effort.

A coordinated initiative among providers, caregivers, consumers, and government agencies, the Advancing Excellence Campaign measures quality outcomes and establishes numerical targets and benchmarks related to quality improvement. The campaign is led by a Board of Directors of the 30 organizations that comprise the coalition. Those organizations are:

Voting Members
Alliance for Quality Nursing Home Care
Alzheimer’s Association
American Academy of Nursing -- Expert Panel on Aging
American Association for Long Term Care Nursing (AALTC)
American Association of Nurse Assessment Coordinators (AANAC)
American College of Health Care Administrators (ACHCA)
American Health Care Association (AHCA)
American Health Quality Association (AHQA)
AMDA – Long Term Care
LeadingAge (formerly AAHSA)
National Association of Health Care Assistants (NAHCA)
National Consumer Voice for Long Term Care
The Commonwealth Fund
The Evangelical Lutheran Good Samaritan Society
Association of Health Facility Survey Agencies (AHFSA)
Foundation of the National Association of Boards of Examiners of LTC Administrators  (NAB)
Gerontological Advance Practice Nurses Association (GAPNA)
Hartford Institute for Geriatric Nursing
National Association of Directors of Nursing Administration in Long Term Care (NADONA/LTC)
National Association of State Long-Term Care Ombudsman Programs (NASOP)
National Gerontological Nursing Association (NGNA)
PHI
Pioneer Network
Service Employees International Union (SEIU)

Non-voting/Government Members
Administration on Aging
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality  (AHRQ)
Assistant Secretary for Policy and Evaluation (ASPE)
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and its contractors, the Quality Improvement Organizations (QIOs) and State Survey Agencies
Department of Veteran’s Affairs

To learn more, please visit http://www.nhqualitycampaign.org.

You are invited to a free webinar on Pain Management Tailored to the Nursing Home Resident. This teleconference, hosted by Kansas Foundation for Medical Care, Inc. and the Great 8 Group is a fantastic way for your whole team to get involved. The presenter for this teleconference is Dr. Cari Levy who will share her knowledge and experience on this important topic. 

Click here for a registration form. Please fax the completed form to 785-273-5130 to the attention of Tami Sterling. If you have any questions, please call Tami at 785-273-2552 x358.