VENTURA COUNTY: Nursing Home Given Last Chance to Keep Funding
The Victoria Care Center in Ventura County got one last chance to keep its Medicare contract, the Ventura County Star reports. A 10-member team of investigators has until Monday to "scour records and interview residents and staff to make sure the facility complies with more than 800 Medicare funding regulations." If the home fails this final test, Medicare and Medi-Cal funding will be cut -- forcing 121 Medicare residents to seek care elsewhere. The 24-hour, 188-bed skilled nursing home was found out-of-compliance with federal regulation in August. Two other visits in December and late January showed the facility below Medicare standards. Victoria Care has been cited for not responding to a resident's assistance light for 18 minutes among other infractions. If the center loses its Medicare contract, it would forfeit more than $2 million in the first six months. Moreover, the loss of Medicare patients to other nursing facilities would be "detrimental to residents and an already crowded Medicare system." Scott Carlson, group vice president for Beverly Healthcare, which oversees Victoria Care's operations, said, "The [Medicare] system is out of control; if anyone looked at the broadly written regulation[s] and the zero tolerance interpretation of them, they would conclude no health care organization could meet them" (Richardson, 2/10).
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