The Lead December 11, 2020 - LeadingAge Illinois

Life Plan Communities/CCRCs:
Member Spotlight: Apostolic Christian Skylines

Assisted Living:
Contact Congress: Seniors and Caregivers Need Help
IDPH Issues Emergency Rule on Testing for Assisted Living and Sheltered Care

Supportive Living:
HFS COVID Reporting Forms Update

Nursing and Rehabilitation:
IDPH and Provider Associations Quarterly Meeting Recap
Star Quality Rating Unfreeze
AHRQ ECHO National Nursing Home COVID-19 Action Network

Independent Affordable/Subsidized Housing:
DEADLINE TODAY: Second Round Applications for HUD COVID-19 Relief Payments
HUD Releases First Evaluation of Supportive Services Demonstration
Affordable Senior Housing: A Scan of State Housing Credit Allocation Plans
HUD Postpones 10-year PCNA Due Dates

Home Health and Hospice:
Hospice Act Passes the House

Other:
HFS Issues Provider Notice on Procedure for Rate Determination and Claim Processing
Introducing the Artmails Program
New Strategic Consulting for LeadingAge National Members
Draft MedPAC Recommendations for 2022
CDC Updated Toolkits
LeadingAge Annual Meeting 2021 Call for Sessions Now Open

Top Stories:

A Message From Katie Smith Sloan, President and CEO of LeadingAge National
LeadingAge President and CEO Katie Smith Sloan wrote a new message on making 2021 better than 2020.

But, in another seeming contradiction, I believe 2021 will also give us great opportunities to safeguard and improve the lives of the older adults we serve—first by working with pharmacies and local public health officials to vaccinate residents and staff, and then by using what we learned during the pandemic to transform our organizations and our field.

Read Katie’s entire message on the LeadingAge Action Plan for the Biden-Harris Administration.

U.S. Congress UpdateThe U.S. House has adjourned until Monday and the Senate has not yet taken up the Continuing Resolution (CR) passed by the House. There is only one day left to pass the CR and have the President sign it.

The House did pass a stop-gap spending bill (S. 8900), to keep the government open till December 18. The Senate received it on Wednesday and now must vote on it. However, there is no new news on coronavirus legislation, or at least, no good new news. Negotiations have dragged on. LeadingAge has seen an outline of the current Senate bi-partisan bill, called the Bipartisan Emergency COVID Relief Act of 2020, but no legislative language has been released and the sticking points continue to be the scope of liability protection for businesses (for the Democrats) and state and local funding (for the Republicans).

Majority Leader McConnell roiled the waters by suggesting that these provisions be stripped from the bipartisan bill, but that is not likely to make the bill more acceptable. The President has recommended adding a direct payment similar to the one that went out to many Americans in the spring, $600 this time, but not clear if that will happen. The Bipartisan bill really is designed to provide enough relief only for a few months, and we expect that the incoming Biden Administration will have its own proposals after January.

The bill includes specific testing dollars for aging services providers (nursing homes, assisted living, HCBS, and a generic category, long term care), along with provisions expanding the use of provider relief funds. While there is no specific funds for low income housing, the moratorium on evictions is extended through January, and the bill appropriates funds to pay for rental and utility arrears. In addition, there are specific allocations for SNAP and senior nutrition programs. The bill also extends and adds to the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP).

Also from Capitol Hill, HR 8874 was introduced on December 4. The legislation creating a pathway for the nursing home workers who were hired under the training waivers to become CNAs without having to take the full NATCEP training program. LeadingAge is looking into the possibility of adding the CNA lock-out bill, to any momentum generated by this bill.

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BD Veritor Training for LeadingAge Members
On December 17 at 2:30pm CST, LeadingAge will host another training on the BD Veritor COVID-19 Testing Device. Educators from BD will provide in-depth training on the system and provide real example and ideas for how to use the system in the most effective and efficient way possible. Register here for this free LeadingAge member training.

Contact Senator Durbin on Civil Liability Protections
LeadingAge continues to work on federal civil liability protections with a coalition of providers associations on this issue at the national level. As part of this effort in Illinois, we are asking for your advocacy in contacting U.S. Senator Richard Durbin (D-Chicago) on the need for protections. Senator Durbin is considered one of the Senators objecting to including liability protections in the coronavirus bill currently being debated.

We are asking for you to send a message to Senator Durbin’s office on why limited liability protections are critical. Senator Durbin has now clinched his position as lead Democrat on Judiciary Committee next Congress, so he is a major figure in this debate.

The staff to contact are:

Joe Zogby: joseph_zogby@judiciary-dem.senate.gov
Dan Swanson: daniel_swanson@judiciary-dem.senate.gov

Here is your message:
I am (NAME AND POSITION) of (COMMUNITY NAME) and I employ (NUMBER OF STAFF) number of senior care associates in Illinois and care for (NUMBER OF RESIDENTS) number of grandmothers and grandfathers. We have (SHARE YOUR STORY ON PPE, OR SAFETY MEASURES OR INFECTION CONTROL) to keep our residents and our associates safe. This is about time limited protections to protect the providers who are caring for the most vulnerable. Thank you for your consideration and please contact me with any questions.

The 2021 LeadingAge Illinois Call for Cabinet Applications is Now Open!
LeadingAge Illinois seeks nominations for Cabinet leadership! As a part of a LeadingAge Illinois Cabinet, you will have the opportunity to lead, influence the future of adult services in Illinois, and network with colleagues in similar roles. Cabinets represent each LeadingAge Illinois member type and set program and public policy goals, provide support and guidance to meet these goals – achieving results in their specialty areas. LeadingAge Illinois’ five industry cabinets represent the following member types: Assisted Living, CCRC/Life Plan Community, Housing, Home or Community Bases Services and Nursing/Rehab.

Interested provider members are asked to review the Cabinet Roles and Responsibilities summary, and complete a Cabinet Application accompanied by your current resume or CV and submit both by Friday, January 8, 2021 to Maribel Rice.

Learn more and apply.

Provider Relief Funds Update
Today’s provider relief fund update includes information on optimizing nursing home incentive payments, and more.

According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), they expect to get the Phase 3 funds out to providers in the next 7-8 days and will share more details early next week on the methodology they are using for those distributions. The October Incentive Payments for Nursing Homes started arriving December 9.

How to Optimize Nursing Home Incentive Payments:
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued Nursing Home Infection Control (NHIC) incentive payments for the September performance period and since their distribution in November, many questions have been asked about who received them, who didn’t, how much was received and why. LeadingAge has prepared an article answering these questions.

Reasons for Missing September Incentive Payments Identified:
HHS reviewed 70 LeadingAge nursing homes to determine why they did not receive an incentive payment for September performance. What has been learned is:

45% of these nursing homes missed the Infection Gateway test;
26% actually received the payment;
15% were missing at least one week of NHSN Data or Failed NHSN Quality Assurance;
another 8% failed an additional quality assurance check (e.g. Missing Occupied bed information or Total COVID Deaths Exceeds Total Infections).

The remaining nursing homes had one of the following issues:

Failed Infection and Mortality Gateway;
Failed the Mortality Gateway; or
their TIN was excluded by HRSA from payment.

Nicole Fallon at LeadingAge has been communicating these issues to each of the nursing homes on the list. What Nicole has learned as she has looked at the disqualifying reason and looked at member data is that nursing homes that are located in counties with low rates of infection can lead to a nursing home being disqualified from an incentive payment for even one case during the performance period.

This is a high bar. Nursing homes with a low number of occupied beds, too, have a hard time getting their per 1,000 resident weeks infection rate below that of the county.

Vaccine Update
Today’s vaccination update includes update and information on Illinois’ plan, FAQs and Resources, AMDAs toolkit, the Pharmacy Partnership, and more.

On Thursday, the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDAs) vaccine advisory panel on recommended that the agency grant an emergency use authorization to the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine.

Illinois Plans:

Illinois is still expected to get 109,000 doses the week of December 13-19 (23,000 to Chicago and 86,000 for rest of state). Illinois will have an additional review panel to ensure the vaccine is effective and safe.
The Governor said the allocations will go to hospital and healthcare workers in the 50 counties with the highest death rates per capita. Catherine Counard, Chief Medical Officer at the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH), reported in a meeting on Wednesday, that long term care vaccinations will come off the top of the shipped doses and that the plan is to rollout facility vaccinations beginning December 28.
IDPH will be tracking shipments and data. Shipments will come directly from the CDC to IDPH and placed in their stockpile. IDPH purchased 20 ultra-cold freezers to house the vaccine.

LeadingAge Meeting with CDC on Pharmacy Partnership:
LeadingAge had their regular weekly meeting with the CDC on the Pharmacy Partnership. Among the highlights:

The CDC does not require consent forms. They say the standard of care is to have a conversation with the individual being immunized and document it. The consent form is from the pharmacy and not the CDC.
There is a CDC long-term care vaccine toolkit coming out next week. CDC staff recommend taking a look as it may answer some questions that come up before the LTC toolkit is out next week.
Providers cannot be charged by the pharmacy for anything at all. Residents and staff cannot be balance billed. The pharmacy partner is responsible for billing Medicare, Medicaid, private insurance or HRSA’s uninsured program.
Information on side effects will likely come out of the FDA and ACIP meetings.
The CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) did not recommend including “independent living” in their 1A recommendation. People who live in independent living on a CCRC campus are NOT covered by the Pharmacy Partnership program.

Vaccine Development:
Recommendations were adopted by CDC to vaccinate both health care personnel and residents of long-term care facilities during the initial phases of COVID-19 vaccine availability. The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) voted on the matter during an emergency meeting December 1. The CDC Director, Dr. Robert Redfield, noted that he would “like to thank the ACIP for all of their work in crafting these recommendations as interim guidance that both 1) health care personnel and 2) residents of long-term care facilities be offered COVID-19 vaccine in the initial phase of the vaccination program. Dr. Redfield supports their recommendations and has signed the memo and accepted these interim recommendations.” Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine achieved its first authorization on the world stage when the United Kingdom granted a temporary authorization for emergency use.

Manufacturing, Distribution, and Administration:
Pfizer published details about the specially designed, temperature-controlled shippers which can maintain its vaccine at recommended storage conditions (-70°C ±10°C) for extended periods of time without any additional equipment except dry ice. The company noted the shipper can maintain temperature for 10 days unopened, which allows for global distribution. Once open, a vaccination center may use the specially designed shippers as a temporary storage solution to maintain the recommended storage conditions up to 30 days, with re-icing every five days in accordance with the handling instructions. If requested with the order, dry ice and a dry ice supply kit will be provided by Operation Warp Speed through McKesson’s contract with UPS Health, within 24 hours of vaccine delivery to refill the thermal shipping container for the first re-ice. Subsequent dry ice refreshes will be required by the administration site.

National Academies Webinar on Building Confidence in Vaccines:
The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine is offering a webinar on Friday December 18 from 10:30 a.m. – 3:00 p.m. CST on Vaccine Confidence. They will offer strategies for leaders to build confidence in covid vaccines to promote uptake.

FAQs and Resources on COVID-19 Vaccines and Issues Surrounding Vaccinations:
In response to numerous inquiries, LeadingAge has prepared a document with FAQs and Resources on vaccinations. They will update the FAQs when more information becomes available. Click here for the latest document.

AMDA COVID-19 Vaccine Toolkit:
AMDA, the Society for Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine released a COVID-19 Vaccine Education Toolkit. The toolkit contains questions and answers about the vaccine, a template letter to residents and families, strategies for improving staff confidence in vaccines and other resources. You will need to set up a name and password to access the toolkit, but it’s free and quickly done.

CMS Proposed Rule on Prior Authorization Data Sharing and “Reducing Burden”
CMS released a proposed rule for payers that appears to cover data sharing, prior authorization and other items. The rule will ostensibly “reduce burden on patients and providers.” More information is to come on a review of this rule.

Governor’s COVID-19 Briefings Recap
LeadingAge Illinois continues to monitor the Governor’s daily COVID-19 briefings for information pertinent to members.

Here is a recap of this week’s briefings:

Cases:
There are over 823,531 total cases and over 13,861 total deaths.

Hospitalizations:
As of Thursday, there were 5,138 in the hospital with 1,081 in ICU, and 606 on ventilators.

Testing:

There now have been over 11.5 million total tests in Illinois.
Illinois averages 96,000 tests per day and is completing 10,000 antigen tests per day.
The Rockefeller Foundation has put together a Coalition on Testing (State and Territory Testing Alliance). There are 22 states, including Illinois, involved that are asking for common protocols, sharing of best practices, common testing frequency and pooling procurement to lower the price of testing supplies.

Life Plan Communities/CCRCs:

Member Spotlight: Apostolic Christian Skylines
Apostolic Christian Skylines in Peoria was first established as a community to care for older adults in 1912. It was named the Peoria Apostolic Christian Home. The current campus was started 23 years later in 1965 in a wooded areas alongside the Illinois River.

Today, Skylines continues their long-standing reputation of providing the highest quality care. The community offers Skilled Nursing, Skilled Memory Care, Assisted Living, Independent Living, and Home Care Services. The organization has around 115 residents that live on campus and serves about 50 clients in their homes off campus. There are 135 staff that work on the campus and 50 staff that work in Home Care.

“We have always had a good reputation and have been seen by the community as the place to go to get high quality care,” said Matt Feucht, Administrator. “We are thankful that over the years this high reputation has remained intact as it has allowed us to remain competitive when newer skilled facilities and assisted living facilities are built around us.

Matt has been in the industry just under 20 years, 16 of which have been at Skylines. He has learned a lot and seen changes in the industry since coming to Skylines, which includes the increase in of assisted living. In nearly two decades in the industry, he is also keenly aware of the challenges providers face, from workforce issues and regulatory burdens placed on providers to low government reimbursement. “Medicaid rates continue to be some of the lowest in the nation yet expectations remain high from Public Health (the Illinois Department of Public Health) and the community,” said Matt.

He has been a vocal leader. As a former member of the LeadingAge Illinois CCRC Cabinet, he worked along with cabinet members to set the association’s agenda on Life Plan Communities and CCRCs. He also has annually been a strong grassroots advocate in the Partners in Quality program, inviting legislators from the state and federal levels into Skylines so they can see quality care and services in action.

Most recently, Matt was a part of a virtual visit with U.S. Representative Darin Lahood (R-18^th District; Peoria), where he informed the representative of the exceptional challenges and issues providers have been facing during the pandemic. Matt’s remarks to the representative also gave him a firsthand look into the heroic work healthcare workers have done to serve older adults. “It was incredible to see how staff stepped up so many times to care for the residents. Staff were courageous and caring as they walked into harm’s way to care for those who needed them,” said Matt.

Assisted Living:

Contact Congress: Seniors and Caregivers Need Help
LeadingAge Illinois joins Argentum in calling on Congress to take swift action to ensure the safety and wellbeing of residents and staff of the communities as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Please join in this effort and send a pre-written letter to your member of Congress and Senators.

IDPH Issues Emergency Rule on Testing for Assisted Living and Sheltered Care
As we reported last week, the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) released their emergency rule on testing for COVID-19 in Assisted Living and Sheltered Care. BinaxNOW test kits are available through your local health department, but you must have a CLIA waiver certificate to conduct this testing. If you have any questions, contact Ruta Prasauskas.

Supportive Living:

HFS COVID Reporting Forms Update
The Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services (HFS) reports that the Supportive Living fax has been incredibly busy and some providers have experienced problems getting their reports through. HFS has a password protected version of the template for reporting positive COVID tests. The form and password, if you do not have them, can be accessed by contacting Kara Helton at HFS.

HFS also wants to remind providers of a few items on COVID Reporting:

Include building name, city and county (top of the form).
Only report positive test results
Only report recent test results; HFS does not need a continuous report of everyone testing positive
Include date test results were received by the SLP (if known).
If a Medicaid resident, please include their RIN and whether the MCO was notified (N/A if not enrolled in Medicaid managed care).
Include only applicable resident comorbidity dx, such as COPD, CHF, DM, afib, PVA, obesity, hx of stroke, etc., which might be impacted by COVID. NO need to list all dx for a resident
If a resident is asymptomatic, but is noted as being sent to the hospital, please note why, such as they experienced a fall, or had UTI.
Indicate if the resident is currently in the building, hospital or transferring to nursing home.
Staff names are not required, only their department, such as dietary, administration, nursing, CNA, etc.
Include contact information for staff person completing the report (bottom of the report) in case HFS has follow up questions.

Nursing and Rehabilitation:

IDPH and Provider Associations Quarterly Meeting Recap
The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) has restarted the quarterly meetings with the provider associations. LeadingAge Illinois and the other associations have had these meetings with the Department for several years. The meeting held on Wednesday afternoon was the first quarterly meeting the Department has hosted since the pandemic began. At this point, the weekly meetings with IDPH on COVID-19 issues will also continue.

Several IDPH staff were involved in the meeting, including Dr. Catherine Counard, Chief Medical Officer and Alfonso Cano, the new Bureau Chief on Long Term Care.

Here is a recap of the meeting held on Wednesday:

Town Hall Meetings:
You may recall that IDPH in recent years, held regional town hall meetings. The meetings would generally be held at a provider community or a local health department office and was intended for providers to hear updates from IDPH staff and have the opportunity to ask questions. The associations asked the Department to restart the provider town hall meetings. IDPH will consider restarting the meetings, which more than likely will be held in a virtual format initially, due to the pandemic.

Surveyor Testing/Vaccinations:
IDPH reported that they still plan for surveyors to be tested and will be given the vaccine.

Temporary Nurse Assistant (TNA) Program:
IDPH is still meeting internally on potential extensions of the program, which expires December 18.

LeadingAge Illinois indicated this program would be invaluable to homes across the state. There are currently 1,700 TNAs in Illinois.

Vaccinations:

50 counties with highest death rates per capita will receive the vaccine first (ex: Whiteside County).
Last Friday, IDPH sent all long term care facilities information to the CDC. LeadingAge Illinois worked to ensure member information was listed in the IDPH submission. IDPH sent a list of about 2,500 facilities to the CDC. The CDC is currently making sure all the information is correct (bed counts, etc.).
The vaccine is still slated to arrive in Illinois on December 13.
Although plans could change, the Department said that long term care vaccinations are coming off the top of the vaccines received. The plan to rollout the facility testing is tentatively slated for December 28.

Annual Surveys:
IDPH stopped surveys for December due to COVID positivity rates statewide. They will restart January 15 in all regions. The oldest dates will be prioritized.

Infection Control Training:
On Friday, CMS issued a notice regarding the mandatory infection control training. The associations asked for an extension beyond December 30. We are waiting to hear back on the request.

COVID Screening:
IDPH still encourages verbal screening and temperature checks.

Involuntary Discharges:
Per executive order, involuntary discharges are still not allowed.

Long Term Care Advisory Board Meetings:
The Long Term Care Advisory Board meeting schedule is as follows (all meetings are open to the public)

February 18
May 20
August 19
November 18
February 17, 2022
May 19, 2022
August 18, 2022
November 17, 2022

Other Important Information:
Summary Table for Phased Reopening and Tiered Mitigation Strategies

Star Quality Rating Unfreeze
CMS announced that the Five Star Quality Rating system will resume all updates with the January 2021 refresh. The health inspections domain has been held constant since April 2020 and various quality measures have been held constant beginning in June. With this update, all three domains will be unfrozen as of January. Recall that CMS also unveiled the new Care Compare site in September, which officially replaced all legacy sites, including Nursing Home Compare, on December 1, 2020. Complete updates to the Five Star Quality Rating system will be available at the new Care Compare site on January 27, 2021. More information on these updates and implications is available here.

AHRQ ECHO National Nursing Home COVID-19 Action Network
The AHRQ ECHO National Nursing Home COVID-19 Action Network is recruiting nursing homes from across the country to participate in a virtual community of practice for improving COVID-19 preparedness, safety, and infection control. To learn more, visit the AHRQ ECHO National Nursing Home COVID-19 Action Network. Also, click here for the ECHO teleseries information.

Independent Affordable/Subsidized Housing:

DEADLINE TODAY: Second Round Applications for HUD COVID-19 Relief Payments
As we reported previously, the HUD announced a second application period for COVID-19 Supplemental Payments from the CARES Act. The filing deadline for multifamily housing owners is TODAY for expenses incurred through November. Learn more here.

HUD Releases First Evaluation of Supportive Services Demonstration
HUDs research arm released the first of three evaluation reports of the IWISH demonstration program, which funds a full-time Resident Wellness Director and part-time Wellness Nurse to work in HUD-assisted housing communities serving older adults. Launched in 2017, the three-year demonstration program aims to determine whether a well-funded, planned model of supportive services coordination in HUD-assisted senior housing provides compelling benefits, which LeadingAge strongly supports. In our meetings with the Illinois Congressional Delegation over the past few months, LeadingAge Illinois HUD Housing Members have educated members of Congress on the IWISH program. More information will be available on these issues is here.

Affordable Senior Housing: A Scan of State Housing Credit Allocation Plans
LeadingAge introduced a new report, Affordable Senior Housing: A Scan of State Housing Credit Allocation Plans, by the National Housing Trust for LeadingAge. How states use Low Income Housing Tax Credits is of great interest, as LeadingAge’s top housing policy priority is to expand the supply of affordable senior housing. You can see Illinois information on page 54. This report will help stakeholders understand states’ use of Housing Credits, by far the largest annual federal expenditure for new affordable housing, for older adults with low incomes.

HUD Postpones 10-year PCNA Due Dates
On December 4, HUD published a memo with supplemental guidance for 10-year Project Capital Needs Assessments (PCNAs). Due to COVID-19, HUD had allowed the postponement of regular 10-year PCNA updates until September 30, 2020; because of continued difficulty conducting in-person CNAs, HUD will extend postponement of its regular 10-year PCNA to March 31, 2021, for properties with PCNA reports that are due between March 15, 2020, and March 31, 2021.

Home Health and Hospice:

Hospice Act Passes the House
As part of the Beneficiary Enrollment Notification and Eligibility Simplification Act (BENES) Act (HR 2477), the House passed the Helping Our Senior Population in Comfort Environment (HOSPICE) Act which was their version of legislation that makes changes to the hospice survey process. The bill is unchanged from the text that was introduced in the winter. LeadingAge is particularly pleased to support the provisions around surveyor education and training, standardization of deficiency data, and promotion of survey consistency across surveying entities. There remains, however, a concern about the increased survey frequency (changing the requirement from every three years to every two years) and the introduction of CMPs into the hospice program. LeadingAge will continue to work with the Senate on these key refinements.

Other:

HFS Issues Provider Notice on Procedure for Rate Determination and Claim Processing
The Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services (HFS) has posted a new Provider Notice regarding HFS Procedure for Rate Determination and Claim Processing as New COVID-19 Testing Codes are Released. Click here for the notice.

Introducing the Artmails Program
LeadingAge Illinois would like to make you aware of a new program soon to launch, called, “Artmails,” an arts education and entertainment series designed for residents that you can access and utilize – at no cost to provider members.

In the coming days and weeks, we are going to email members weekly installments of “Artmails” that were curated by a Norwalk, Connecticut-based nonprofit executive who was concerned about the negative impact of the Covid-19 lockdown on his 91-year-old mother, a resident of a senior living community and a lifelong amateur artist.

Each Artmail profiles a different modern or contemporary artist, principally 20th and 21st century painters but also sculptors and photographers. Each episode lasts 30-40 minutes on average. The focal point of the Artmails are embedded YouTube videos that display the profiled artist’s work. The Artmails usually also include some bio on the artist as well as brief, personal commentary from the curator.

Artmails was developed by the executive in the hopes that it would help her and others in her retirement community as they grappled with the loneliness and isolation of their COVID lockdown. All told, he created 50 Artmails – one a day each weekday for 10 consecutive weeks. The Artmails are not the work of a trained art historian or critic – they are not professionally “produced” or slick and the quality of the YouTube videos can be uneven. The series can provide value for senior citizens with an interest in modern/contemporary art. For curious minds who would like to expand their horizons and learn something new. For residents who may want to shake up their day-to-day routine.

Each Artmail episode offers your residents the opportunity for arts education, entertainment and diversion during this challenging time. Depending upon your outlook and/or point of view, even joy and beauty.

We can all use more of that these days! More information will be included in the emails that will be sent to member providers’ Activity Directors beginning next week. We also plan to post the “Artmails” on the LeadingAge Illinois website. We hope you enjoy this exciting new program!

New Strategic Consulting for LeadingAge National Members
Looking for a deeper level of direct support around your organization’s care delivery? With ATI Advisory, a research and advisory services firm, LeadingAge National can work with you to transform the delivery of health care and aging services for older adults. ATI helps provider organizations like LeadingAge members to evaluate market opportunities and assess options for developing new partnerships, capabilities, and risk-arrangements. Learn more about LeadingAge Consulting and working with ATI.

Draft MedPAC Recommendations for 2022
MedPAC is set to vote on recommendations to eliminate Medicare payment updates for hospice and skilled nursing facilities and reduce the base payment for home health by 5 percent, as well as wage adjust and reduce the hospice aggregate cap by 20 percent when the Commission meets in January. More details are available from December’s meeting here.

CDC Updated Toolkits
The CDC has updated their toolkits to combat COVID-19 for retirement communities, older adults and people at higher risk.

LeadingAge Annual Meeting 2021 Call for Sessions Now Open
Do you have an idea for a session that should be part of next year’s Annual Meeting? Submit your ideas for consideration through the online call for sessions form. This year, an organization can submit a maximum of one proposal and the submission deadline is January 25, 2021. Learn more and submit your proposal today.