nursing homes

If federal officials accept a court’s decision, some patients will get a chance to seek refunds for their nursing home and other expenses.

We want to hear how pandemic visitation restrictions affected your family.

In Florida, only half of fully vaccinated nursing home residents have gotten the booster for COVID. When you add unvaccinated residents into the mix, just 41% are boosted.

COVID cases and deaths are rising again in nursing homes across the country due to the highly contagious omicron variant. Staffing shortages are adding to strain and workers report "moral distress."

A bill being considered by legislators would cut the required time that a nurse or CNA spends with a patient in a long-term care facility from 3.6 hours to one hour. It would also permit nonmedical staff to replace CNAs for 2.5 hours every day.

The bill would direct health care providers to allow patients or residents to have visitors. If access needs to be restricted for health or safety concerns, "alternate visitation protocols" would need to be developed.

Jeff Johnson spoke to WMFE about nursing homes and long-term care facilities, and other issues that could affect seniors this legislative session.

The tests heading to long-term care facilities were stockpiled during a “downturn” and expired at the end of the year. The state has been waiting for an answer from the federal government on whether they are usable.

The CDC reports that 81 percent of nursing home residents in the state are fully vaccinated, but only 39 percent have received a third dose.

Power outages that followed Hurricane Irma affected 28,000 residents of Florida's nursing homes — and led to a 25% increase in deaths a week after the storm made landfall in September 2017.