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VA Health Care: Better Data Needed to Effectively Use Limited Nursing Home Resources

HEHS-97-27 Published: Dec 20, 1996. Publicly Released: Dec 20, 1996.
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Highlights

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on the Department of Veterans Affairs' (VA) nursing home programs, focusing on: (1) the distribution of veterans in VA, community, and state veterans nursing homes; (2) the costs to VA for VA, community, and state veterans nursing homes; (3) the factors affecting VA's use of community and state veterans nursing homes; and (4) whether VA, community, and state veterans homes provide comparable quality care.

Recommendations

Recommendations for Executive Action

Agency Affected Recommendation Status
Department of Veterans Affairs As part of VA's ongoing efforts to improve nursing home resource management decisions, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs should direct the Under Secretary for Health to more accurately accumulate and report nursing home costs, assess the availability of community nursing home resources, and identify locations where current reimbursement rates are not competitive.
Closed – Implemented
VHA reported that it completed implementation of its Decision Support System software in November, 1998, a system that allows collection of cost data for nursing home care. VHA also reported efforts to increase competitiveness of nursing home reimbursement rates, for example, by giving local VA facilities the option to approve exemptions from the standard payment rate (which is based on Medicaid schedules plus 15%). In addition, the Undersecretary of Health commissioned a study to develop a strategy on how to best meet the long term care needs of veterans by assessing the availability of community nursing home resources and other alternatives.

Full Report

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Topics

Community health servicesData integrityHealth care cost controlHealth care costsHealth resources utilizationMedicaidMedical services ratesMedicareNursing homesPatient care servicesVeterans benefitsQuality of care