JUST IN: After Months Of Refusing, Indiana Will Identify Nursing Homes With Coronavirus Outbreaks

07/02/2020

After Months Of Refusing, Indiana Will Identify Nursing Homes With Coronavirus Outbreaks

Emily Hopkins-Indianapolis Star

July 1, 2020

Indiana officials will releaseÂ facility-level data for COVID-19 in nursing homes, a drastic departure from previous policy, which shielded that information from public view.

For weeks, family members of nursing home residents, lawmakers, resident advocates, and media, including IndyStar, have repeatedly called on the government to identify the homes suffering from COVID-19 outbreaks. But state officials repeatedly refused.

Dr. Dan Rusyniak, chief medical officer for the Family and Social Services Administration, said the state is changing course after the largest associations that represent long-term care facilities and AARP expressed their support for providing facility-level information. The Indiana Health Care Association and the Indiana Center for Assisted Living, which represents and lobby on behalf of the long-term care industry, expressed their support for releasing facility-level data, according to the state.

“We’ve started from the beginning that we have been focused on early identification and mitigation of COVID-19 outbreaks in long-term care facilities,” Rusyniak said during a press conference. “As we have all learned, responding to this pandemic requires us to continuously evaluate our approaches, and when appropriate, to change them. This is one of those times.”

Past Refusals

Amid initial concerns about the lack of information, Dr. Kristina Box, the state’s health commissioner, issued an order on April 8 requiring nursing homes to report positive cases and deaths to state and local health departmentsÂ within 24 hours. By that time, 31 people had died in 12 facilities.Â On April 27, the health department began posting statewide data regarding long-term care facilities to its dashboard.

Gov. Eric Holcomb and Box, however, repeatedly denied requests for information about outbreaks at specific nursing homes, despite news reports of families who said they had trouble getting information about their loved ones from nursing homes.

Box cited the “personal” relationship between facilities and family members, while Holcomb referenced his respect to the homes as private businesses,Â even though more than 90% of nursing homes in Indiana are owned by county hospitals.

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In May, state Rep. Ed Delaney, D-Indianapolis, called on Holcomb to release the data. Rep. Chris Chyung, D-Dyer, echoed those calls a week later.

On May 19, the AARP of Indiana, which represents older Hoosiers, sent a open letter to Gov. Holcomb asking him to release the information.Â “It is essential that Indiana provides as much information as possible to long-term care residents and their loved ones, especially during this public health emergency,” state director Sarah Waddle wrote in the letter.

What To Expect

It will take some time to build a dashboard that will allow the public to search by facility, he said. This will require comprehensive reporting by nursing homes of a list of staff and residents who have contracted COVID and when those cases occurred, going back toÂ March 1.Â Rusyniak hopes the data will be collected by mid-July when the state will make the dataÂ available to the public in a “preliminary form.”

The state will also build out a dashboard to launch 2-3 weeks after the initial release of the data.

The state will also analyze the results ofÂ a June initiative to test all skilled nursing staff. Last month the state tested 40,000 staff from more than 480 facilities. The state is working with its data partners, the Richard M. Fairbanks School of Public Health and the Regenstrief Institute, to analyze that data.

“We’ll use this analysis to better inform us on who needs testing and how often,” Rusyniak said.

Rusyniak also reported that weekly new cases in long-term care facilities were down 77% and deaths were down 83% compared to their peak in late April. He attributes the improvementsÂ to several measures, including the state’s targeted strike teams, personal protective equipment, and close collaboration with the nursing homes.

He also credits the behavior of Hoosiers withÂ limiting the spread of the virus.

“By decreasing community spread through social distancing, washing your hands, fewer nursing home staff were exposed and unknowingly went to work with COVID-19,” he said.

The state is also moving forward with plans to allow in-person visitation as early as July 4 for some facilities. In June, Indiana was one of the first two states to open to outdoor visitation at nursing homes.

FOOTNOTE: Emily Hopkins is a data reporter for IndyStar’s investigative team. Reach them at 317-444-6409 or emily.hopkins@indystar.com.

After Months Of Refusing, Indiana Will Identify Nursing Homes With Coronavirus Outbreaks

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