Medicare and Medicaid have a five-star rating system for nursing homes throughout the country. One star means you're "much below average" while five makes you the shizizzle. Gracedale was rated at just one star shortly before the election. Although everyone agrees the home has a staffing problem, Administrator Jennifer Stewart-King told me that had nothing to do with the rating. She explained this poor grade was due to a failure by the county's third-party IT provider. It dropped the ball in providing data to federal officials, who automatically assume the worst. Without the software that is supposed to make everone's lives easier, Gracedale's staff had to transmit the data manually. In December, Stewart-King told me that she was hopeful that the rating would go up when the next ratings come out in January.
They did. In the most recent rating by Medicare and Medicaid, Gracedale is rated at two stars. That's still "below average," but is an improvement over its last rating.
The total number of nurse hours per resident per day is 2 hours, 17 minutes. The national average is 3 hours, 46 minutes. The Pennsylvania average is 3 hours 40 minutes. Thus, the nursing care at Gracedale is about 60% what you'll find nationally.
Gracedale does better with health inspections, both nationally and statewide. It is rated three stars (average) in that category.
It also has done a better job with COVID-19 vaccinations. 90.9% of residents are vaccinated, compared to 87.4% nationally and 89.5% statewide. In addition, 83.5% of the staff is vaccinated, about two percentage points higher than the sate and nation.
13 comments:
How far will you go to prop up your boy? Gracedale is floundering under th direct control of McClure He kicked out the professional company running it and put in two handpicked puppets who take orders directly from him. From one star to two, that is great? So, he can't get Gracedale working right after his RFOUR YEARS AND NOW HE WANTS TO START A NEW HUGE BUREAUCRACY A COUNTY HEALTH DEPARTMENT? I BET YOU WILL BE PRAISNG THAT AS WELL. YOU Have TO WONDER WHICH GROUP OF POWER INFLUENCERS WANT HIM TO DO THAT. The chamber AND THE POWERBROCKERS HAVE PUSHED DTHE IDEA. IT IS A GREAT SOURCE OF PATRONAGE JOBS AND CASH CONTRACTS. SOUND LIKE McClure WILL BUILD UP HIS CAMPAIGN TREASURY EVEN MORE THAN HE HAS.
GRACEDALE IS DYING ON THE VINE AND HE WILL DESTROY IT FOR HIS NEW TOY.
There is absolutely no reason for these poor ratings. Pay people a decent wage and treat them well and you will hire good people to work for you. LVHospital is advertising that they will pay nurses a $30,000.00 bonus to come work for them and their pay is much higher than Gracedale. You no longer get medical benefits when you come to work at Gracedale but your pension is better. Everything except for the pension is against hiring people to come work for you. TIME TO DO A WAGE STUDY. IT'S WAY OVERDUE
1 Star to 2 Stars is a 100% improvement! Raises, bonuses and high fives for everyone!
Yikes, but no surprise. Everyone knows Gracedale is the poor house of local LTCF options. If you have a heart and the money, you don't place loved ones in Gracedale. Given a choice, would you send your loved one to any LTCF that struggles to achieve a "below average" rating? Taxpayers continue to operate this cruel enterprise and should take responsibility for what they're inflicting on our most precious citizens. Either dump millions into the place and give huge raises to everyone there, or dump the place altogether. The half-baked approach is harming our elderly.
The claim that Gracedale has no medical benefits is blatant disinformation.
12:56, Tge only reason you know McClure is considering a health department is bc I told you and in an article that was critical of the idea. Also, I generally will decline to publish comments in CAPSLICK
January 27, 2022 at 6:08 AM Anonymous said... LVHospital is advertising that they will pay nurses a $30,000.00 bonus..
Why do you think that is? I'll tell you why. They're in the same boat with staffing shortages even after offering some current nurses $40 an hour to stay. Secondly that $30,000 it comes from emergency government funds (taxpayers).
You no longer get medical benefits when you come to work at Gracedale
Many of the current nurses at LVHN are traveling contracted nurses which means they don't receive any from the hospital either.
Lehigh Valley Live: $17M is coming to the Lehigh Valley to hire and retain nurses. Here’s what each hospital will get.
(Northampton County, long term structured residence: $61,330)
12:56, is right. Gracedale needs major renovations as well as a pay study. If the county plans to keep it. Some rumors are McClure is fine with it fading away to pay for his new project. He acts like he single handedly saved Gracedale while it was really the families sand employees that did that. Now he wants an expensive new Health Department. That is insane. He will probably end up selling Gracedale to fund his new ego dream. Who is pulling his strings?
Hospital are non-profit money sucking organizations. They are leaches on a region that just suck cash out of the area. Look at areas with growing business entities like manufacturing and logistics and surprise surprise hospitals and health networks are thriving. They get all kinds of give me as non-profits with minimal tax give backs to the areas that they are in. While the small local entities get the dark end of the stick.
Gracedale employees have the best benefits around. Great healthcare, government holidays(double the private sector). Vacation separate from sick time and very generous time(compared to PTO significantly less in total number of days) a pension. Should I continue? County workers have it the best compared to all private sector jobs in healthcare. Historically the salary was slightly lower because of the great benefits. Having said that if management was superior and the facility right sized to staffing it would attract good employees. A one or two star home does not attract new good employees.
Just wait until the deficiencies from October, 2021 are posted to the nursing home compare website, Bernie, and then possibly those from January, 2022. That star rating will drop like a rock again.
annon 12:59, you are right. Keep in mind that while McClure loves to brag how he loves Gracedale, he plans to let it go belly up and sell it. Insiders are aware his ultimate goal is no different than Stoffa and the home will be sold. Sad but there it is. He got rid of the private firm running it so he could manipulate the result.
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