NY Times Article Exposes Chronic Understaffing in Nursing Homes

A July 7, 2018 New York Times article – It’s Almost Like a Ghost Town. Most Nursing Homes Overstated Staffing for Years – reports that most nursing homes had fewer nurses and caregiving staff than they had reported to the government for years.

The story is based on an analysis of new federal data on nursing home staffing by Kaiser Health News. It found:

• There are frequent and significant fluctuations in day-to-day staffing at nursing homes, with particularly large shortfalls on weekends;

• On the worst staffed days at an average facility, caregivers had to care for nearly twice as many residents as they did on the best staffed days;
• One quarter of nursing homes did not comply with the federal requirement to have an RN on duty each day for at least 8 hours;
• Seven in ten nursing homes have lower staffing than previously reported, with a 12 percent average decrease; and
• The federal government’s staffing ratings on Nursing Home Compare continue to exaggerate staffing performance and mask the thin and erratic levels of people working from day to day.

The Times also published an interactive map that shows reported staffing levels at over 14,000 U.S. nursing homes.

Read the NY Times Article