STATE NEWS
KDHE Proposed Home Health Agency Regulations Webinars
If you provide home health services, please plan to attend one of the upcoming webinars and provide comments on the newly proposed home health agency regulations from KDHE. Upcoming webinar dates are June 20th, June 21st and June 28th. Register for the webinar here.
VACCINE NEWS
“Up to Date” Definitions
Confusion remains around the definition and uses of “up to date”. Currently, nursing homes are following 2 separate definitions for nursing home operations and NHSN reporting. Read more on these definitions, why they differ, and when to apply each in this LeadingAge article.
FEDERAL NEWS
CDC Rescinds Order Requiring Negative Pre-Departure COVID-19 Test Prior to Flight to the US
On Friday, June 10TH CDC announced that the Order requiring persons to show a negative COVID-19 test result or documentation of recovery from COVID-19 before boarding a flight to the United States, will be rescinded, effective on June 12, 2022 at 12:01AM ET. This means that starting at 12:01AM ET on June 12, 2022, air passengers will not need to get tested and show the COVID-19 test result or documentation of recovery from COVID-19 prior to boarding a flight to the U.S. The COVID-19 pandemic has now shifted to a new phase, due to the widespread uptake of highly effective COVID-19 vaccines, the availability of effective therapeutics, and the accrual of high rates of vaccine- and infection-induced immunity at the population level in the United States. Each of these measures has contributed to lower risk of severe disease and death across the United States. As a result, this requirement which was needed at an earlier stage in the pandemic may be withdrawn. CDC continues to recommend that those travelers boarding a flight to the U.S. get tested for current infection with a viral test as close to the time of departure as possible (no more than 3 days) and not travel if they are sick. Secretary Becerra released a statement on the CDC decision here
COVID Treatment Public Information
The Medicare Team at CMS shared public information today, urging consumers to act quickly to test for COVID-19 when they have symptoms and quickly seek therapeutics if they do test positive. Given the confusion about Paxlovid among consumers and the general public, this information may be helpful for LeadingAge members to share with residents, tenants, consumers, patients and staff. The CMS announcement includes a link to this CDC resource. It was updated at the end of April; however, many individuals do not know about it.
LEADINGAGE KANSAS NEWS
Join Us Each Friday for Our Weekly Webinars
Please note, we will not have a Friday Webinar on June 24th as it is Regional Roundtable Week.
Get the latest on COVID-19, CMS, the Legislature and more each Friday at 10 AM. If you haven’t registered for future calls, you can do so here. If you would like to listen to updates you have missed, visit this page.
LEADINGAGE NATIONAL NEWS
Upcoming Coronavirus Update Calls
Is technology going to help solve the workforce crisis in aging services? The answer is a resounding yes…in part. How, then, will technology solve some of the workforce and service delivery issues we face post-COVID-19, and how can that technology be successfully integrated into daily operations? On
- Wednesday, June 15th at 2:30 PM CDT, we will hear from Dusanka Delovska-Trajkova, Chief Information Officer at Ingleside, a LeadingAge member based in Maryland. Dusanka will discuss innovations that span from robots in the dining room, to systems integration, to a new staff role to serve as a technology liaison between residents and staff.
- There will not be an Update Call on Monday, June 20th; LeadingAge is closed for the Juneteenth Holiday.
If you haven’t registered for LeadingAge Update Calls, you can do so here. You can also find previous call recordings here. Note that to access recordings of the calls you need a LeadingAge password. Any staff member of any LeadingAge member organization can set up a password to access previous calls and other “members only” content.
RESOURCES
Food Allergy Is Associated with Lower Risk of SARS-CoV-2 Infection
NIH published a study that found people with food allergies are less likely to become infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, than people without them. In addition, while previous research identified obesity as a risk factor for severe COVID-19, the new study has identified obesity and high body mass index (BMI) as associated with increased risk for SARS-CoV-2 infection. In contrast, the study determined that asthma does not increase risk for SARS-CoV-2 infection.
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