Trend Data Shows a Decrease in Antipsychotic Medication Use

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has released a report which provides a brief overview of the National Partnership, summarizes activities since April 2014 and outlines next steps for future Partnership efforts. Additionally, this report describes the results of the Focused Dementia Care Surveys conducted in fiscal year 2015 and the conclusions gathered based upon post-survey data analysis.

The report covers the period of Calendar Year (CY) 2014 quarter two, through CY 2015, quarter three. There has been a decrease of 28.8 percent of long-stay nursing home residents receiving an antipsychotic medication, to a national prevalence of 17 percent.

In 2016, CMS continues to conduct additional focused dementia care surveys across the country, targeting nursing homes that have high rates of antipsychotic medication use. CMS will continue data analysis of state to state and regional variation in enforcement activity.

LeadingAge New York encourages providers to utilize the websites, tools and resources made available:

• Webpage for the national partnership, located on the CMS Survey and Certification General Information website which provides links to related Survey and Certification policy memorandums, as well as other useful websites.

• Advancing Excellence website contains an extensive set of webpages specific to the National Partnership with detailed technical assistance, tools, and educational resources available for free in the public domain.

• Hand-in-Hand, a six DVD training series to train nursing assistants on abuse prevention and person-centered dementia care; which is a training tool created in response to the Affordable Care Act, which directed CMS to develop training for nursing assistants on abuse prevention and dementia care. It was distributed for free to every certified nursing home in the country in 2012.

Contact: Nancy Truland, ntruland@leadingageny.org, 518-867-8872