Devastating Series of Medicare Cuts and State Medicaid Cuts Combined with President's Proposal will Affect Access to Care
Washington, DC -A coalition composed of long term caregivers sounded the alarm today in response to President Obama's proposed Medicare and Medicaid cuts included in his deficit reduction package announced Monday saying key direct care jobs in skilled nursing facilities will be affected by more funding reductions. Ultimately, the proposed cuts may compromise access toskilled nursing care for seniors. The Coalition to Protect Senior Care (CPSC) pointed to $42 billion in Medicare cuts over ten years directed at post-acute care providers included in the President's proposal as impossible to implement without affecting the delivery of long term care.
"We cannot move blindly forward with these cuts," said Joleann Beene, RN, RAC-CT, CDONA, with the Nurse Executive Council (NEC), a member of the CPSC. "It is incumbent upon us to make our lawmakers and the President fully aware that more deep funding cuts to skilled nursing care cannot be considered in isolation because our facilities have already been faced with a series of devastating reductions implemented over the last several years. If these cuts are implemented, it will not be business as usual. Seniors' ability to obtain needed care will be affected and caregivers will lose their jobs and that is not a positive outcome for long term care in this country."
Beene urged the President and members of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction now negotiating about how to trim $1.5 trillion from the federal budget to consider the cascade of cuts already imposed on skilled nursing care that amount to more than $125 billion over the next decade. Another round of funding cuts could force long term care facilities to make very difficult choices, with some even closing asbaby boomers begin to require long term health care services. Fewer long term care facilities coupled with higher demand for services could mean some seniors will not have access to the care they need.
"America's rural towns are some of the most seriously threatened overall by the sluggish economy and worrisome unemployment rate," said Maggie Elehwany, President of the National Rural Health Association and a member of CPSC. "Skilled nursing facilities are often the biggest employer in rural towns and the only facility for miles that can provide care for seniors."
The Coalition to Protect Senior Care is traveling the country urging caregivers, their residents and the family members of elderly Americans to help tell the story of long term care in America and to highlight the essential role of caregivers play in providing quality care to the most vulnerable in our country.
"We all need to do our fair share when times are difficult and we know these are trying times for the economy with folks struggling to keep or find work," noted Beene. The long term caregiver community has contributed its fair share to deficit reduction and we are at tipping point now. We respectfully ask the President and legislative leaders to recognize that and continue the difficult task of deficit reduction without balancing numbers on the backs of the elderly or their hardworking caregivers."
Among the Coalition to Protect Senior Care membership are: American Association for Long Term Care Nursing (AALTCN) | Alliance for Quality Nursing Home Care | American College of Health Care Administrators (ACHCA) | American Health Care Association (AHCA) | American Health Quality Association (AHQA) | American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA) | American Physical Therapy Association (APTA) | American Society of Health Care Administration Executives (ASHCAE) | Coalition of Women in Long Term Care (COWL) | National Association of Health Care Assistants (NAHCA) | National Association for the Support of Long Term Care (NASL) | National Rural Health Association | Senior Clinician Group.
Contact: Rebecca Reid
(410) 212-3843
/PRNewswire-USNewswire -- Sept. 23, 2011/
SOURCE Coalition to Protect Senior Care
