On Sept. 10, the Senate Finance Committee approved the Elder Justice Act (S. 1070) as well as the Patient Safety and Abuse Act of 2007 (S. 1577) with unanimous votes.

Elder Justice Act

Introduced by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), S 1070 would provide $777 million for the creation of an Elder Justice program. The bill would direct the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to offer grants to be used for the creation of stationary and mobile forensic units and provide abuse and neglect services for the elderly.

Under the bill, the HHS secretary also would be required to provide grants that enable long-term care (LTC) facilities to offer their employees further training and certification. The grants would also provide bonuses or other benefits to those employees able to achieve certification.

Grants also would be provided for LTC facilities to help offset the costs for “standardized clinical health care informatics systems designed to improve patient safety and reduce adverse events and health care complications resulting from medication errors.”

LTC facility owners would be required to notify both the HHS secretary and the appropriate state regulatory agency of a facility’s impending closure. The owners would also need to include a plan detailing how residents would be transferred.

The House bill is H.R. 1783.

Patient Safety and Abuse Act

Meanwhile, S. 1577 would require a national criminal history background check for all LTC facility employees that have direct access to patients.

In addition, the measure would require that the FBI inform state law enforcement, which would in turn notify facility owners, if an employee receives a conviction at any time after the initial background check.

The legislation, sponsored by Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.), would actually expand a current seven-state demonstration project by providing $160 million in grants over three years to states interested in joining the program.

“The earlier demonstration project kept thousands of prospective employees with disqualifying criminal records from gaining access to nursing home residents and other frail patients,” Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) noted.

We at AAHSA have been long-time supporters of a national background check system and AAHSA is a member of the Elder Justice Coalition.