Washington, DC – Commenting on today’s release of the Institute of Medicine’s (IOM) new report, “Retooling for an Aging America: Building the Health Care Workforce,” the American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living (AHCA/NCAL) said the report points the government and the provider community in the right direction in terms of policy objectives, and underscores the vital importance of the long term care workers, who care the elderly and persons with disabilities, to the nation’s labor force.
“While we are taking the time to study the details of the new IOM report, we believe it points our nation in the right direction in terms of being able to meet the growing long term care needs of a rapidly-aging nation, and building a dynamic, effective long term care workforce capable of providing excellent care in the years and decades ahead,” stated Bruce Yarwood, President and CEO of AHCA/NCAL. “We will provide additional comment as we further analyze the report, yet it is very clear the gravity and scope of the analysis demonstrates the critical nature of the debate at hand.”
Yarwood said AHCA/NCAL strongly agrees that the rising number of older Americans, along with the demographic characteristics, health needs and care settings, necessitate immediate changes related to the education, training, recruitment and retention of the health care workforce. “We are already actively involved in projects and initiatives directly responsive to the IOM’s suggested three-pronged approach to enhancing the competence of all individuals in the delivery of geriatric care, increasing the recruitment and retention of geriatric caregivers, and redesigning existing models of care.”
The AHCA/NCAL President and CEO said that because nearly 70 percent of skilled nursing operating costs are labor-related, ongoing funding shortfalls have a major impact on the front lines of care. Funding shortfalls also negatively influence staffing, jeopardize intra-facility quality improvement efforts, and can even cost the jobs of the very staff that make a key difference in the quality of care and quality outcomes.
“Integral to any discussion about strengthening America’s long term care workforce is a discussion about the increasingly dysfunctional nature of our long term care financing structure – and we intend to continue this discussion by promoting our profession’s plan to overhaul the nation’s long term and post-acute care systems,” Yarwood said.
The plan, assembled with the help of Avalere Health, is being promoted nationally by AHCA/NCAL and the Alliance for Quality Nursing Home Care and can be found at www.ahca.org.
The American Health Care Association and National Center for Assisted Living (NCAL) represent nearly 11,000 non-profit and proprietary facilities dedicated to continuous improvement in the delivery of professional and compassionate care provided daily by millions of caring employees to 1.5 million of our nation's frail, elderly and disabled citizens who live in nursing facilities, assisted living residences, subacute centers and homes for persons with mental retardation and developmental disabilities. For more information, please visit www.ahca.org or www.ncal.org.