TIP: QIO Nursing Home Quality Essentials Spotlight: Infection Control

Telligen QI Connect™ has an attend-as-you-can series focusing on infection control topics relevant to SNFs and aimed at enhancing infection control efforts. Each session provides guidance, relevant tools, and helpful interventions to support quality improvement efforts. This AAPACN resource is copyright protected. AAPACN individual members may download or print one …

TIP: Understand Why Discharged Residents Trigger QMs 

A common question regarding MDS 3.0 Quality Measures (QMs) is why a discharged resident continues to trigger after leaving the facility. This is explained in section two of the MDS 3.0 Quality Measures User’s Manual, available in the Downloads section of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ QM webpage. …

TIP: The COE-NF Is Releasing New In-Service Toolkits

The Center of Excellence for Behavioral Health in Nursing Facilities (COE-NF) is releasing new in-service toolkits. These toolkits address essential topics such as de-escalation, substance use disorder, and major depressive disorder. Designed to guide facility education leads, the toolkits provide comprehensive support for every step of the training process, from …

TIP: CMS Releases FY 2025 Expected Responsibilities of State RAI Coordinators and Appendix B Update

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) recently released the Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 Mission & Priorities document (MPD). This document includes the expected responsibilities of the State Resident Assessment Instrument (RAI) coordinator: CMS expects the states to continue to provide staff to serve as RAI/MDS educational and technical …

TIP: New NHSN COVID-19, Influenza, and RSV Reporting Requirements

Starting Jan. 1, 2025, facilities are required to electronically report new information about COVID-19, influenza, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) to the National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN). According to the Dec. 31, 2024, Quality, Safety & Oversight memo, QSO-25-11-NH, “The new data elements that LTC facilities are required to report …

TIP: CMS Released Updated MDS 3.0 QM User’s Manual

In late December, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released an updated version of the MDS 3.0 Quality Measures (QM) User’s Manual (version 17.0), which went into effect Jan. 1, 2025.   The major changes from version 16.0 to 17.0 include two significant revisions. CMS revised the guidance on …

TIP: AAPACN Released Q&A From the 2024 Quality Virtual Conference

The AAPACN 2024 Quality Virtual Conference concluded each day with a robust live question and answer (Q&A) session, but not all questions had the opportunity to be answered live. AAPACN recently released the answers to over 30 questions to accompany the conference resources in a two-part Q&A document. For those …

TIP: AAPACN and APIC Release New Infection Prevention Resources for Long-Term Care Facilities

AAPACN in collaboration with the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC) has released a practice guidance tool and resource guide to help healthcare personnel in long-term care facilities implement enhanced barrier precautions (EBP). The practice guidance tool outlines when EBP should be implemented for residents, provides infection …