NY Nursing Homes Rank Among the Worst for Support and Family Caregivers!

AARP published an annual nursing home report card was just posted online and the stats don't bode well for New York. Each year, the State Long-Term Services and Supports (LTSS) Scorecard provides a multidimensional approach to measure state-level performs of LTSS systems that provide assistance to older people and to adults with disabilities. It focuses on "four dimensions": (1) affordability and access; (2) choice of setting and provider, (3) quality of life and quality of care; and (4) support for family caregivers. The report can be accessed here: http://www.longtermscorecard.org/.

The top states are Minnesota, Washington, and Oregon while the lowest states are Mississippi, Alabama, and West Virginia. Unfortunately, New York is closer to Mississippi then Minnesota; the overall combined ranking of New York is just a abysmal 41st.

Particularly when it comes to support for family and caregivers, New York ranks 48th! Additionally, New York ranks last many important sub-areas, such as "median annual cost for private-pay nursing home resident, as percentage of median household income, age 65," "percent of adults age 18 with disabilities living in the community who usually or always get needed support," "percent of home health patients with hospital admission," and "percent of caregivers who usually or always get needed support, while also ranking 43rd in "assisted living and residential care units per 1,000 population age 65" and 44th in "legal and system supports for caregivers."

The news isn't all dim. The brightest spot New York has is that they are second best at enrolling low-income disabled adults in Medicaid. But the tradeoff here is that New York ranks amongst the worst regarding private-paying patients.

What will this score card do? Hopefully help Governor Cuomo's Medicaid Resign Team mobilized to press more sweeping changes in New York. Moreover, this might rotate the spotlight on some of the under-performing nursing homes or home health care agencies and put more pressure on them to improve their standard of care. A solution particularly combating New York's weak ranking of support services for caregivers could relate to another post I recently wrote regarding CareBridge.org. Such a website functions almost as a "Facebook of Recovery," permitting patients to post blogs, stories, and pictures during their illness.

This news, hopefully, we be the impetus New York needs to improve the care to our state's aging population. With a rank so low, this only will increase the amount of medical malpractice, negligence, and harm done to the ones we should be respecting the most. What do you think? I'd love to hear from you. I welcome your phone call on my toll-free cell at 1-866-889-6882 or you can drop me an e-mail at jfisher@mmolaw.net. You are always welcome to request my FREE book, The Seven Deadly Mistakes of Malpractice Victims, at the home page of my website at www.protectingpatientrights.com.