CMS Failed to Publicly Post Deficiencies for Two-Thirds of Nursing Homes, OIG Find

McKnight’s Long-Term Care News | By Kimberly Marselas
 
Medicare’s Care Compare site did not accurately reflect nursing home deficiencies in two-thirds of listings reviewed by a federal watchdog agency, a finding that implies more than 10,000 health, life safety or emergency preparedness violations may have been left out of view of consumers.
 
The report, issued early [last] Wednesday by the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General, also found that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services sometimes reported deficiencies to Care Compare that were not found in survey documentation. Scope and severity levels were also inaccurate for one out of every three nursing homes reviewed in a small sample, the OIG said.
 
While the OIG’s attention was trained on CMS, the findings also stand to malign nursing homes by reinforcing the idea that deficiencies are widespread in the sector. It could also lead to renewed CMS attention to public reporting accuracy, which in some cases could benefit consumers and nursing homes.
 
“Consumers rely on the information they find on Care Compare to make informed healthcare decisions and expect it to be accurate; the information can set the expectation for a consumer’s experience with a particular nursing home,” the OIG said in a report reviewed exclusively by McKnight’s Long-Term Care News Tuesday. 
 
“The findings in this report demonstrate the need for CMS to take additional measures to ensure that the information it reports on Care Compare for nursing homes is accurate.”
OIG said CMS’ processes for reviewing inspection results both before and after they were reported on Care Compare “were not adequate.” Though CMS hires contractors to upload deficiency information to Care Compare, OIG found the agency relied on state survey staff to confirm accuracy after posting and on nursing homes to self-report inaccuracies.
 
CMS had not replied to a McKnight’s request for comment by deadline.
 
The OIG audit was based on a sample of 100 nursing homes and their Care Compare listings. Overall, the watchdog found that there were missed deficiencies in 67 cases.
 
Those included missed health deficiencies for 34 nursing homes — one of which was a J-level deficiency issued during a complaint inspection following the fire-related death of a patient who used in-room oxygen. 
 
OIG also found missing fire safety deficiencies for 52 nursing homes, and emergency preparedness deficiencies missing for two nursing homes. In addition, for 42 of the 100 sampled nursing homes, CMS did not report results on Care Compare about the yearly fire safety and emergency preparedness inspections. Each sample was compared to deficiencies documented in state surveyors’ inspection and complaint reports dating back three years.
Extrapolating that, OIG estimated inaccurate deficiency listings for 10,303 of the nation’s 15,377 nursing homes at the time the samples were pulled in December 2020.

Read Full Article