"The problem is, in the nursing home industry, making money means cutting care," says Julie Eisenhardt, a spokeswoman for Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which represents employees at about 15 Manor Care homes and which spearheaded a campaign to raise awareness about the buyout.
"They're not there to invest in the care for the residents, they're there to make money," says Charlene Harrington, a professor of nursing at the University of California, San Francisco, and author of the 18-month study. "The way these chains have made money is by cutting the staff to the bare bones and pocketing the profits."
Harrington, who is part of a team that has researched nursing homes for 25 years, says the privatization of chains allows companies to shirk regulatory scrutiny because they are not required to file financial documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) or state regulatory agencies.
"These chains have had so many quality problems that they have wanted to go private in order to keep from having the litigation they have," she said.
"I think the size of the transaction, the nature of the business of the proposed buyer and the effects that could be felt by our most frail and vulnerable populations require us to give the proposal extra scrutiny," said State Rep. Greg Harris (D-Chicago) at a December hearing before the Illinois Department of Public Health, which regulates the state's nursing facilities.
In December, financial news service Bloomberg reported that the Manor Care purchase was the eighteenth sale of a nursing home operator in the United States in four years. Experts say investment firms' interest in nursing facilities is partially an effort to cash in on the aging of baby boomers into the system.
"As boomers get older, taking care of them is going to be big business," says Eisenhardt of SEIU. "The question is: Do we as a society think it's right that people are trying to make money off taking care of our most vulnerable population?"
What do you think, should "for profits" be prohibited ? Any Boomer's thoughts?
We have five pts and one wife who lives with her husband. One cat and our two crazy dogs :). We were a level three home, now we are a level two though we obtain exemptions for any level three pts, we currently have one who has lived there for twelve years. We provide end of life care and all of our pts die at home with us and their families.
Specializes in Case mgmt., rehab, (CRRN), LTC & psych.
I've worked in for-profit nursing homes.
I currently work night shift at one for-profit nursing home. It accomodates 130 beds, and I must care for nearly 70 patients during night shift by myself. There's another nurse in the building, but she's caring for 60 of her own patients. I admit I must use shortcuts to get everything done.
If the owners of my place of employment really cared about the elderly residents, they would hire more nurses to lighten the workload.
This has been happening in the US for a long time, a patient cannot get Medicaid until all their own personal funds have been depleted.I believe the spouse can live in the house and upon the death of that spouse, the house gets sold and half the profits get paid back to Medicaid. If the spouse moves out of the house and into the nursing home also, they must sell the house and use the profits from their share to pay for their nursing home stay, until that money runs out and any other monies in accounts, annuties , etc. all must be depleted before Medicaid will pay . I believe the elderly parents can gift some of their savings to their children, but it must be done within a certain amount of years, before they can apply for Medicaid.I may have some of my facts wrong, if anyone can correct them , feel free.
It infuriates me that our elderly are made to make themselves paupers, while this country hands out free health care (and social decurity), to illegal immigrants who have not paid a dime into this country, and the felons and convicts in our prisons.
Specializes in med-surg 5 years geriatrics 12 years.
I work in a not-for profit facility; even tho we are nonprofit we still have to watch the spending closely but instead of making money for profit holders the money is spent on resident needs and paying staff as well as they can. If you do it for the right reasons the money will come.....case in point we have quite a long waiting line for those wanting to enter our facility.
I have worked for both profit and non-profit over the years. They all watch the all mighty dollar spent. One of the for profit employers I worked for had no prblem giving me anything I asked for when it came to equipment or staffing.... he ended up selling to a corporation. The non-profits are still very tight with their money also due to the zero balance they need to keep. It is very difficult to get equipment or staff from those also.
I don't think it is a matter of who owns a facility but, what the reimbursement rates are. Our medicaid rate of residents is ever crawling higher and that means we are losing money. I don't see how we survive on the money the gov't is giving out. I just finished my fiscal budget for the next year and for my 80 employees alone, wages are over $3 million and that is separate from my operating and capital budget.
happydays352
165 Posts
We have five pts and one wife who lives with her husband. One cat and our two crazy dogs :). We were a level three home, now we are a level two though we obtain exemptions for any level three pts, we currently have one who has lived there for twelve years. We provide end of life care and all of our pts die at home with us and their families.
Can you tell that I like were I work