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Performance of high Medicaid nursing homes: contextual and management factors
Investigator (PI): Weech-Maldonado, Robert
Performing Organization (PO): (Current): University of Alabama at Birmingham, School of Health Professions, Department of Health Services Administration / (205) 934-5665
Supporting Agency (SA): Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ)
Initial Year: 2014
Final Year: 2019
Record Source/Award ID: RePorter/R01HS023345
Funding: 2014 Award Amount: $1,249,873
Award Type: Grant
Abstract: Equitable access to high-quality nursing home care for older and disabled populations is an important public policy issue given the aging and increasingly diverse U.S. population. Nursing home care has been described as a two-tiered system with the lower tier consisting of facilities housing predominantly Medicaid residents. These facilities are likely to have a higher proportion of minorities, and report lower quality care and operate in a resource-constrained environment as their payer mix is predominantly Medicaid with lower reimbursement rates than Medicare and private pay. However, we observe performance variations across these resource-constrained facilities in both quality and financial performance. The proposed study will focus on the role of structural, market, and management factors in explaining quality and financial performance variations among nursing homes with high Medicaid census (>85%). Using a mixed-methods approach, our study will address the following research aims: 1) examine the structural and market factors associated with high performance among nursing homes with high Medicaid census; 2) examine the association of management factors (leadership style, strategic orientation, human resource management [HRM] practices, and knowledge management) with high performance among nursing homes with high Medicaid census; 3) examine whether nursing staff turnover mediates the relationship between management factors (leadership style and HRM practices) and performance among these nursing homes; and 4) explore how and why the factors tested in specific aims 1-3 may influence high performance from the perspectives of nursing staff and nursing home management. Our study is innovative in that it will be the first mixed-methods study to explore contextual factors that may explain performance differences among facilities with high Medicaid census. This study will use a mixed-methods, sequential explanatory design, consisting of two distinct phases, quantitative followed by qualitative. The quantitative analysis will use secondary data as well as survey data. The analytic sample for the survey will consist of managers from approximately 1000 nursing homes with high Medicaid census, and the qualitative sample will consist of interviews with nursing staff (6) and managers (2) from eight nursing homes (high and low performance) for a total of 64 interviews in 4 states (California, Georgia, New York, and Texas). The study findings will allow policymakers and nursing home managers to better understand the structural, market, and management factors associated with better performance in resource-constrained nursing facilities. We believe that the findings of our study and their dissemination will provide an impetus for developing interventions to improve the performance of these facilities in terms of lower costs and better quality. This may, in turn, reduce health care disparities for low income, minority, elderly, and disabled residents in these facilities, which are among AHRQ's priority populations.
MeSH Terms:
  • California
  • Georgia
  • Health Policy
  • Health Services Accessibility
  • Humans
  • * Medicaid
  • Minority Groups
  • New York
  • Nursing Homes /*economics
  • Poverty
  • Quality of Health Care
  • Reimbursement Mechanisms
  • Texas
  • United States
  • United States Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
Country: United States
State: Alabama
Zip Code: 35233
UI: 20153296
Project Status: Completed