Rural Nursing Homes hope for legislative change

NEW ULM, Minn. (KEYC) -

Nursing homes across the state are reimbursed, but the way they’re reimbursed sets their ability to pay expenses... the biggest expense is paying staff. They’re supposed to receive these reimbursements in January, but in 2022 they received the year’s funding in August. This isn’t the same for the metro.

Wendy Broderson, the Manager of Oak Hills Memorial Foundation said “The Twin Cities received their rates in April of 2022. Their cost reports are audited sooner, their rates are higher, and they’re reimbursed faster than we’re reimbursed in greater Minnesota.”

Broderson says it hinders the way nursing homes in greater Minnesota pay their staff, shutting locations down; forcing people in their Autumn years out of a town they’ve called home.

Jeanette Landstein, wife of an Oak Hills resident said “It’s important being in your own community and not be shipped away... sent off to somewhere a couple hours away. It’s hard mentally and physically... I’ve seen it”

Landestein and her husband, a Vietnam war veteran spent three and a half years trying to find a facility able to care for him, one close to home. She believes they were fortunate to finally find a bed.

At oak hills, they’re hoping for a piece of the budget surplus, to tide them over until legislation pulls through.

Ann C. Vogel, the primary care physician and operating board member said “Just shove a billion dollars in there and give it to the people that are in the administrative jobs, so that these nursing homes don’t fold...you don’t take that away from people. You don’t take it away from a population. That’s why. We’re hanging in.”

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