COVID-19 Long-Term Care Resources
Topic Collection
January 12, 2021
Topic Collection: COVID-19 Long-Term Care Resources
This Topic Collection focuses on plans, tools, templates, and other immediately implementable resources to help with COVID-19 preparedness, response, recovery, and mitigation efforts, focusing on long-term care.
Please refer to CDC’s Coronavirus Disease 2019 webpage for the most up-to-date clinical guidance on COVID19 outbreak management.
If you have COVID-19 best or promising practices, plans, tools, or templates to share with your peers, please visit the ASPR TRACIE Information Exchange COVID-19 Information Sharing Page (registration required) and place your resources under the relevant topic area. Resources specific to long-term care can be placed under the COVID-19 Long Term Care Resources Topic.
Education and Training
This page provides instructions to sign up for scenario-based training from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services for frontline nursing home staff and management. The five module training course for frontline clinical staff and ten module course for nursing home management are based on COVID-19 lessons learned and findings from the federal COVID-19 nursing home task force strike teams.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This webinar is part of the National COVID-19 Clinical Rounds hosted by ASPR, Project ECHO, NETEC, and other public-private partners. This special session focused on long term care facilities and featured speakers from FutureCare and GRECC VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
General Resources
This joint document from associations representing the long-term care (LTC) and hospice communities provides guidance on the risk-benefit analysis between implementing strong infection prevention measures and the best interests of LTC residents.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This toolkit is a compilation of considerations for long-term care facilities based on lessons learned during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic accompanied by resources to inform planning and response efforts.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This article describes practical tips about how to provide psychological services to older adults living in nursing homes during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This fact sheet - updated as needed - describes flexibilities available to long term care facilities participating in Medicare or Medicaid.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This document shares lessons learned and recommendations for mitigation, infection control and responsive delivery of care to residents of nursing homes.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This document provides select healthcare entities (e.g., nursing homes, assisted living facilities, Intermediate Care Facilities for Individuals with Intellectual Disabilities, long-term acute care hospitals, inpatient rehabilitation facilities, and dedicated hospice facilities) an overview of general considerations, potential strategies, and existing resources they may use to inform changes to their COVID-19 related operations and crisis standards of care (CSC) processes. It is intended to complement, not replace, existing state and/or local guidance and plans for implementing CSC.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This article offers advice to nursing homes that need to send residents to other facilities for dialysis treatment during the COVID-19 pandemic. The author discusses cohorting dialysis patients, limiting tub use, surveillance frequency, transport protocols, symptom reporting, masking, adherence to care plans, and collaborating with dialysis providers.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This report offers six overarching recommendations for support teams to aid COVID-19 preparedness and response in long-term care facilities.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This page includes links to governmental and private sector COVID-19 resources for residents and staff of nursing homes and long-term care facilities. Resources include guidance documents, webinar and event recordings, news articles, advocacy information, and links to other organizations. Also included is sign-up information for the daily 20-minute National Nursing Home Huddle.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This webinar from the National Academy of Sciences highlighted how the states of Maryland and Massachusetts are addressing a number of challenges in nursing homes, including staffing shortages, expanding access to COVID-19 testing, and maintaining transparent communications with residents’ families and the public. Access slides at https://www.nationalacademies.org/event/04-22-2020/keeping-nursing-home-residents-and-staff-safe-in-the-era-of-covid-19-a-webinar * or https://www.nationalacademies.org/event/04-22-2020/docs/D20B4F2AD00C95EC8FA23857D28DE0FB6C87B4736573 * Access more information at https://www.mass.gov/news/baker-polito-administration-announces-new-funding-outlines-ongoing-steps-to-support-long-term *
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
Infection Prevention
In an effort to keep infectious individuals from interacting with non-infected individuals, some facilities may consider cohorting processes in Long Term Care (assisted living or nursing home). This fact sheet provides cohorting considerations related to staff, supplies, space, supports, and finances and refers to cohorting guidance from CMS.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
These slides from a March 13, 2020 webinar provide information on prevention and detection of the introduction of COVID-19 in skilled nursing facilities, preparing to receive and care for residents with suspected or confirmed COVID-19, preventing transmission of COVID-19 within facilities, infection prevention strategies, and donning and doffing personal protective equipment.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This document provides guidance and resources to address the behavioral health implications of social distancing and isolation for older adults due to current social distancing guidance in place for senior living facilities.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This Concept of Operations document provides an overview of recommendations and resources for nursing homes that can help reduce the impact of COVID-19 on residents and staff.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This web page identifies actions that LTCs should take to ensure their staff is ready to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. It includes planning considerations for infection prevention and control; identification, isolation, and care for COVID-19 patients; and links to additional resources.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This advisory provides recommendations to support the physical health of nursing home residents through social distancing, infection prevention, and information sharing activities. It also provides links to virtual resources that may support the mental and emotional health of residents.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This toolkit contains several resources to assist long-term care facilities respond to COVID-19. Resources include: Long-Term Care Infection Prevention Assessment Tool, Infection Prevention Staffing Worksheet, links to infection prevention education resources, strategies to optimize facemasks and gowns, and What to Expect: Response to New COVID-19 Cases or Outbreaks in Long Term Care Settings.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This report identifies gaps and offers solutions to enable stronger mitigation strategies specific to COVID-19 and other emerging issues that may impact the at-risk population residing in long-term care environments in New England and beyond.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This document follows the initial set of conclusions and recommendations to combat the spread and mitigate the impacts of COVID-19 to long-term care residents (published on September 9, 2020). The Task Force highlights additional topics, not addressed in the initial set, that continue to affect this population, with updated context to reflect the current landscape of the pandemic. Furthermore, this document extends the topics to include nonMedicare-funded congregate care facilities such as assisted living facilities and group homes.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This document provides guidance to long term care facilities on measures to implement immediately and additional steps to be taken if COVID-19 infection is confirmed in a facility.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
The authors describe facility-wide point prevalence testing for SARS-CoV-2 at 26 skilled nursing facilities in Detroit. Overall, 55% of those with symptom data available were symptomatic at the time of their first positive test. The authors suggest that symptom-based screening is inadequate to detect infection in skilled nursing facilities and repeated point prevalence surveys can improve identification of asymptomatic cases, implementation of infection prevention practices, and prioritization of resources.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This planning checklist may be used by long term care facilities to guide their implementation of social distancing measures. It includes general planning assumptions and steps to take: 1) before COVID-19 transmission is confirmed in the community, 2) once locally acquired cases are present in the community, 3) when outbreaks are reported in other facilities or institutions in the community, and 4) when there is a possible outbreak in your facility.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
The state health department established this web page to collect resources to assist LTC facilities in their response to COVID-19. Included is a sample visitor announcement; guidance for persons at higher risk for serious illness, for LTCs, and for transfers between LTCs and other healthcare settings; LTC facility outbreak criteria; a nursing home infection prevention assessment tool; information on the state’s point prevalence testing order; and LTC reporting requirements.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
Plans, Tools, and Templates
This three-page color-coded table provides an overview of surge strategies that skilled nursing facilities may implement to address limitations in space, staffing, and supplies and equipment.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This webpage includes information on the nursing home incident command system (NHICS), which can be used by facilities regardless of size or resident care capabilities, and is intended to assist with their emergency planning and response efforts for all hazards. Links to the NHICS guidebook, forms, response guides, Job Action Sheets (JAS), and training are included.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This page includes guidance on preparedness and response efforts of nursing homes and other long-term care settings. It also includes a link to infection control guidance for these settings.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This resource page displays data reporting by certified Medicare skilled nursing facilities and Medicaid nursing facilities. Users may view individual facility data as well as view maps of total resident cases and deaths by state and resident cases and deaths per 1,000 residents by state.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This toolkit assists Medicare providers in understanding regulatory flexibilities associated with provision of telehealth visits, virtual check-ins, and e-visits during the COVID-19 pandemic. It provides information that may be helpful in establishing a telemedicine program, including policy guidance, implementation guidance, links to state statutes, telehealth setup basics, technical assistance sources, vendor selection information, and resources for nursing homes, patients, and the community.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This toolkit is a compendium of innovative actions that states implemented to protect nursing home residents during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This document contains an algorithm and supplementary pages about how testing for COVID-19 is paid for in US nursing facilities.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This Concept of Operations document provides an overview of recommendations and resources for nursing homes that can help reduce the impact of COVID-19 on residents and staff.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This one-page grid indicates the types of personal protective equipment that should be worn by residents, visitors, and various staffing roles in long term care facilities under contingency standards of care for COVID-19.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This comprehensive toolkit provides information for long-term care facilities to prepare for and respond to COVID-19. Appendices include checklists, logs, signage, a sample risk assessment, and forms.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This resource page for LTC owners, administrators, and staff and their emergency preparedness partners includes downloadable Word templates to create contingency staffing and testing plans for LTCs. Also included are webinar recordings describing how to use each of the plan templates and guidance on effectively developing a testing plan using the template. While developed for the COVID-19 pandemic, these resources may be used for other epidemics that stress staffing and testing resources.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This tool is intended to assist nursing facilities in developing their pandemic preparedness and response plans. It consists of several modules, which are to be used as a guide to facilitate discussion and to ensure that key points related to a specific topic, such as human resources, are identified and addressed in the planning process. It also includes sample policies and procedures and a module on ethics/values.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This toolkit collects various resources to support New Jersey's long term care facilities responding to COVID-19. It contains state level guidance, checklists, a hospital discharge tool, guidance on discontinuation of transmission-based precautions, donning and doffing resources, information on the state's long term care capacity portal, copies of state executive orders, and links to a competency checklist and additional educational information.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This checklist for acute and long term care facility administrators offers guidelines for evaluating capacity and capabilities and applying structures to maximize them in preparation for increased patient volumes.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This toolkit contains several resources to assist long-term care facilities respond to COVID-19. Resources include: Long-Term Care Infection Prevention Assessment Tool, Infection Prevention Staffing Worksheet, links to infection prevention education resources, strategies to optimize facemasks and gowns, and What to Expect: Response to New COVID-19 Cases or Outbreaks in Long Term Care Settings.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This guide provides recommendations on reducing unnecessary medications, simplifying medication management, and reducing opportunities for transmission of COVID-19 between residents and staff of post-acute and long-term care facilities.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This toolkit based on lessons learned during the successful response to a COVID-19 outbreak in a hospital provides guidance to skilled nursing facilities to prevent, contain, and mitigate COVID-19 in their facilities.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This planning checklist may be used by long term care facilities to guide their implementation of social distancing measures. It includes general planning assumptions and steps to take: 1) before COVID-19 transmission is confirmed in the community, 2) once locally acquired cases are present in the community, 3) when outbreaks are reported in other facilities or institutions in the community, and 4) when there is a possible outbreak in your facility.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This website compiles, visualizes and provides downloadable data about numbers of COVID-19 cases occurring in long term care facilities, by U.S. state.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
The state health department established this web page to collect resources to assist LTC facilities in their response to COVID-19. Included is a sample visitor announcement; guidance for persons at higher risk for serious illness, for LTCs, and for transfers between LTCs and other healthcare settings; LTC facility outbreak criteria; a nursing home infection prevention assessment tool; information on the state’s point prevalence testing order; and LTC reporting requirements.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
Testing
This document contains an algorithm and supplementary pages about how testing for COVID-19 is paid for in US nursing facilities.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
The authors describe facility-wide point prevalence testing for SARS-CoV-2 at 26 skilled nursing facilities in Detroit. Overall, 55% of those with symptom data available were symptomatic at the time of their first positive test. The authors suggest that symptom-based screening is inadequate to detect infection in skilled nursing facilities and repeated point prevalence surveys can improve identification of asymptomatic cases, implementation of infection prevention practices, and prioritization of resources.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
The state health department established this web page to collect resources to assist LTC facilities in their response to COVID-19. Included is a sample visitor announcement; guidance for persons at higher risk for serious illness, for LTCs, and for transfers between LTCs and other healthcare settings; LTC facility outbreak criteria; a nursing home infection prevention assessment tool; information on the state’s point prevalence testing order; and LTC reporting requirements.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
Transfer/Discharge
This form guides hospitals through the assessment of patients prior to transfer to a post-acute care facility.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This form guides assessment of post-acute care and behavioral health patients prior to transfer to a hospital.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This document provides criteria on which hospitalized patients should be evaluated and tested prior to release to a post-acute care facility, when hospitals can discontinue transmission-based precautions for infected patients, when patients can safely be transferred to post-acute care facilities, and if infected patients whose condition has improved can be discharged to their homes.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This web page summarizes rules for: 1) interfacility transfer for patients with laboratory confirmed COVID-19 to a long-term acute care, skilled nursing, or group living facility, 2) interfacility transfer for patients with suspected COVID-19 to a long-term acute care, skilled nursing, or group living facility, and 3) discharge of patients with laboratory confirmed COVID-19 to their home or a non-congregate, non-healthcare setting.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
This one-pager summarizes discharge rules for emergency room patients suspected to have COVID-19, but who do not require hospital admission. The document includes information for residents of long-term acute care, skilled nursing, and group living facilities.
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
Agencies and Organizations
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article
Login to rate, favorite, and comments on the article