Nurse to resident ratio in LTCF

[Trixxy]

Need help please...

Does anyone know the 'legal' nurse to resident (patient) ratio in a long term care facility?

[Nurse Soc Mom]

There is no federally mandated patient/staff ratio. Dependent upon the state you live in there are many ppd mandates. In Colorado it is a 2.0 with the exception of VA nursing homes it is 2.5 direct patient care staff. The way that I personally try to staff is based on the resident acuity score from the MDS. That is as accurate as I can get in LTC. Many LTC try to undercut the direct patient care which is biting off your right arm. Work with your DON and MDS nurse with the RUGGS scoring to see what the acuity is. You can even narrow down the acuity by wings or groupings as pods to make assignments more fair. There is legislation to try to mandate RN-patient and CNA to patient ratio, but with the state of the economy and the difficulty it is to recruit staff that will be a challenge to pass.