CMS Urges Timely Patient Access to COVID-19 Vaccines, Therapeutics
Today, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid
Services (CMS) issued new guidance that highlights the need for health
care providers and suppliers to ensure patients have access to the
latest available COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics. In particular, CMS
is reminding nursing homes that they are required to offer the COVID-19
vaccines, including any updated COVID vaccines, to residents.
In a new Quality, Safety & Oversight (QSO)
memo, CMS reinforces the importance of COVID-19 treatments for
preventing serious illness from COVID-19 and saving the lives of
high-risk individuals who would otherwise be at risk of severe
complications.
CMS is also reemphasizing the need
for providers and suppliers to stay up to date with COVID-19
vaccinations, including any updated COVID vaccines, as they provide the
best defense against severe illness, hospitalization, and death from the
virus.
CMS is encouraging nursing homes, in
particular, to increase their vaccination efforts and review and
reinforce their infection control protocols. CMS requires nursing homes
to educate residents and staff on the risks and benefits of the COVID
vaccines and offer to administer the vaccine. In addition, in
consultation with their physician and family, nursing homes should
ensure residents who test positive for COVID-19 receive appropriate
treatments.
Since COVID vaccines first became available in late
2020, CMS has worked hard to ensure their availability to nursing home
residents, and almost 87% of nursing home residents have completed the
initial series of COVID-19 shots. However, CMS is concerned that recent
data shows that only about 44% of nursing home residents are up-to-date
on their current recommended vaccines. The agency is particularly
disappointed that some facilities are reporting that zero residents have
received the updated bivalent vaccine, and we will be looking closely
at these facilities.
Working in conjunction with our Quality
Improvement Organizations (QIOs), CMS has offered individualized
assistance in providing vaccinations to residents in over 85% of the
country’s skilled-nursing facilities. As part of the agency’s
work to promote vaccination uptake, CMS will be meeting with QIOs later
this month to bolster their outreach efforts and to set up more
vaccination clinics at nursing homes across the country.
Moving forward, CMS will also continue to look
closely at outbreak status and where poor outcomes are occurring at the
nation's nursing homes.
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