How to choose a nursing home

Almost all people enter a nursing home through a hospital. Speak with the Discharge Planner about where they intend to place your family member or friend.  Understand that hospitals have their favorite nursing homes and those are not measured by the quality of care.  Here is the most important thing to know at the hospital discharge stage. It is very difficult to make a nursing home placement “off the street.”  Why?  When a person is discharged to the nursing home for skilled care Medicare will pay for the first few weeks of care. Here is the point: Medicare’s payment for skilled care is a multiple times more that the nursing home’s daily rate for private pay. The only time you will have any bargaining power is at the point of discharge from the hospital.  Move your family member or friend to a good nursing home. Here’s how to choose a good nursing home:

• First: visit the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS)  nursing home compare website. There you will find a complete list of nursing homes in the area you are looking. Here
• Second: Understand what the star rating of a nursing home means at the CMS web page “Brief Explanation of Five‐Star Rating Methodology“
• Third: Use the handy CMS “Questions to Ask When You Visit a Nursing Home” checklist.
• Fourth: Visit the nursing home and ask to take a tour of the facility. Do ask about a visitor’s lounge where family or friends can meet with the person they came to see.
• Fifth: go back to the nursing home and ask family members about the care in the nursing home.

All the best to you

Jim