Coronavirus Update #44
Update from HFAM, New Survey, In the Media, CMS "Office Hours"
HFAM Update and New Survey

Thank you for all you and your teams are doing to provide quality care to Marylanders in need during this historic fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. As we are in the early days of the COVID-19 care surge in Maryland, remember that you are saving lives and that skilled nursing and rehabilitation centers in Maryland are an asset – not a liability. We know that you are dedicated to keeping residents, patients, and staff safe and to providing outstanding quality care to your residents and patients.

As you know, HFAM has been working behind the scenes with the Maryland Hospital Association (MHA) and individual hospital partners for over a month. We have also coordinated larger sector calls with LifeSpan and LeadingAge Maryland, and have also been working and coordinating behind the scenes with those associations. And again, HFAM has been working closely with MHA and our acute-care partners, and our investments and preparation for the care surge will serve us well; and to be clear, we’ve have been proactive and unified in our critical asks to Maryland State government.
 
Some things under our control:

  • We’ve been advocating within our sector and asking you to prepare over the last two weeks to create isolation units in your centers. The Governor ordered this on Sunday. Not all centers are physically suited for this, however more are able to do this than not.

  • It is critical now wherever possible for these units to be further segregated in to observation units and isolation units. Some SNF centers where COVID-19 cases emerged early are already doing this. Going forward, it is important that all SNFs work towards this further segregation because of the potential clinical categories of patients you could possibly accept:

  • Asymptomatic assumed exposed (not treated in the acute setting for COVID-19) –> observation.

  • Previously COVID-19 treated, no fever or symptoms, clinically stable –> isolation

**AN ASK**
 Please complete THIS SURVEY by noon tomorrow April 8 to share your available bed capacity, available observation bed capacity, and available isolation bed capacity, by center.
NOTE:  We may ask a select group of SNF medical directors to get on a call with hospital partners later this week. MHA would organize this call.

What our acute care hospital partners know:

  • They will likely not be able to handle the acute-care surge without the ability to transfer patients.
  • They are striving to find ways to help SNFs with PPE.
  • They may be called upon to provide direct Infectious Disease Control MD/RN support for SNFs. Both sectors will be stretched so thin so we shall see.
  • They may be called to provide staffing support in SNFs at the most critical time. Again, both sectors will be stretched so thin, we shall see.

NOTE: Individual hospitals and in some cases state leaders continue to work with individual SNFs to create entire COVID-19 centers.

We, along with others, have been pressing state leaders for key decisions and will continue to do so. In the meantime, the work we are directly doing together with MHA, individual hospital leaders, medical suppliers, the media (more on that below), and with LifeSpan and LeadingAge is even more important. We are advancing the ball proactively where we can.

Reminders: 

  • We continue to urge centers to take non-COVID-19 med/surg patients from Maryland hospitals. It is critically important that Maryland post-acute providers accept routine and hard to place non-COVID-19 hospital transfers now in order to help free-up acute care in hospitals for COVID-19 patients.

  • It is a MUST that SNFs now create separate wings, units, or floors by moving current residents to handle admissions from the hospitals, and to keep current residents separate, if possible. HFAM has asked the state for a waiver of the 30-day involuntary discharge rule to accommodate the clinically prudent separation of patients and residents.

  • Proactively over-communicate with staff, patients, residents, and families.

  • Employees cannot come to work if they are symptomatic or are directly linked to the increasingly reported positive cases.
In the Media

Joe DeMattos on WMAR

On Sunday, HFAM President & CEO, Joe DeMattos was interviewed by WMAR right after the announcement of Governor Hogan's recent executive orders relating to our sector.
Mark Parkinson on Fox News 

Yesterday, AHCA/NCAL President & CEO Mark Parkinson appeared on the Fox News program America’s Newsroom, talking about the impact of COVID-19 on America's long term care facilities, the need for priority testing and PPE, and how federal and state officials can help.
CMS "Office Hours" on COVID-19

You are invited to CMS “Office Hours” on COVID-19 , Tuesday, April 7 from 5:00 – 6:00 PM EST, the first in a series of opportunities for hospitals, health systems, and providers to ask questions of agency officials regarding CMS’s temporary actions that empower local hospitals and healthcare systems to:

  • Increase Hospital Capacity – CMS Hospitals Without Walls;
  • Rapidly Expand the Healthcare Workforce;
  • Put Patients Over Paperwork; and
  • Further Promote Telehealth in Medicare

Submit questions in advance to [email protected] , including “Office Hours” in the subject line. There will also be live Q&A.
Conference lines are limited, so CMS highly encourages that you to join via audio webcast , either on your computer or smartphone web browser. You are welcome to share this invitation with your colleagues and membership.

  • Toll-Free Attendee Dial In: 833-614-0820
  • Event Plus Passcode: 6793622
  • Audio Webcast link
Did you miss HFAM's previous alerts?

Visit our website to view all previous HFAM alerts, as well as guidance
from our federal and state partners.
Thank you.

We cannot thank you enough for the dedication and diligence in doing all that you can for the residents in your communities. HFAM continues to monitor the COVID-19 pandemic with our state and national partners and will do all we can to support you during this time.