FTC head hears nursing residence worries

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Federal Commerce Fee Chair Lina Khan made a shock go to to Baraboo on Thursday, talking at an occasion organized by Sauk County residents who sought to ratchet up stress on state regulators to dam the county’s sale of the nursing residence it operates.

The Sauk County Board of Supervisors voted final month to promote the Sauk County Well being Care Middle to for-profit Aria Healthcare. The nursing residence was in-built 2008, however the county has operated a care facility in some kind since 1871 — utilizing it to deal with ailments starting from smallpox within the early 1900s to Alzheimer’s within the Nineteen Nineties, in response to the county’s web site.

Opponents concern that promoting the publicly run nursing residence will worsen care.

Aria, which didn’t reply to a number of requests for remark, operates three Wisconsin amenities within the Milwaukee space. One facility obtained 39 federal well being citations in a yr, almost 30 greater than the U.S. common.

“The considerations that you simply’ve raised about what you are worried will occur if this sale goes by may be very salient for us,” Khan mentioned.

A woman hands a piece of paper to a woman seated in a room full of people. — Trish Henderson, a volunteer with Residents for the Sauk County Well being Care Middle, passes name to motion packets to residents throughout a gathering concerning the proposed sale of the Sauk County Well being Care Middle on Oct. 3, 2024, at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Baraboo, Wis. (Joe Timmerman / Wisconsin Watch)

Three different county boards in Wisconsin have tried to denationalise public amenities this yr. Specialists say nonprofit and government-owned amenities nationwide are exploring gross sales as a consequence of growing labor prices and different challenges worsened by the pandemic.

“We’ve been watching with some alarm as an increasing number of mergers and consolidation imply that fewer and fewer gamers are coming to manage necessary elements of the well being care system,” Khan mentioned.

The FTC, an unbiased company that enforces antitrust legislation, usually opinions gross sales a lot bigger than that of the Sauk County Well being Care Middle. That leaves the Wisconsin Division of Well being Companies to resolve its destiny, Khan mentioned.

State officers take into account an organization’s monetary stability and previous efficiency in evaluating a change of possession utility.

The state well being division has not obtained that utility for the Sauk County facility, spokesperson Elizabeth Goodsitt mentioned.

The division can have 60 days to approve or deny the sale as soon as it does.

The division blocked the sale of three SSM Well being nonprofit nursing houses to New Jersey-based Full Care final month, citing the for-profit firm’s frequent federal citations. Full Care operates 4 Wisconsin nursing houses. The U.S. Facilities for Medicare and Medicaid Companies provides a type of houses “beneath common” scores.

“We now have submitted further info that we consider will tackle their considerations and hope to obtain a last choice quickly,” a Full Care spokesperson instructed WPR and Wisconsin Watch in an e mail.

A man holds up a folder and a piece of paper while he talks into a microphone and stands at a podium between two seated women. — Tom Kriegl, a volunteer with Residents for the Sauk County Well being Care Middle, addresses residents throughout a gathering concerning the proposed sale of the Sauk County Well being Care Middle on Oct. 3, 2024, at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Baraboo, Wis. (Joe Timmerman / Wisconsin Watch)

The Sauk County nursing residence has an “common” Medicare score underneath its public possession. One in all Aria’s houses has a “beneath common” score. The opposite two are “a lot beneath common.”

That doesn’t fear Sauk County Board Chair Tim McCumber.

“Aria is dedicated to taking more durable instances, and whereas they might like to see these scores enhance, it doesn’t take a lot to knock them down,” he mentioned in an interview.

David Grabowski, a professor of well being care coverage at Harvard Medical Faculty, calls that line of protection a little bit of an excuse. Everyone seems to be entitled to high quality care, he mentioned in an interview, and analysis suggests residents of public nursing houses usually fare higher than people in privately owned houses.

“Actually the protection web in a number of markets are these government-owned amenities,” Grabowski added.

People sit in rows of chairs. — Residents move round informational packets throughout a gathering concerning the proposed sale of the Sauk County Well being Care Middle on Oct. 3, 2024, at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Baraboo, Wis. (Joe Timmerman / Wisconsin Watch)

However native governments have been steadily promoting nursing houses to for-profit firms over the previous 25 years, he mentioned.

Joice Meyer, who lived at Sauk County Well being Care Middle in 2020 whereas recovering from non permanent leg paralysis, mentioned the county can’t let that occur.

“Sauk County goes to care for you, and so they at all times have, and I’m certain that they’re going to stick with it so long as they’re allowed to,” Meyer instructed the gathering in Baraboo on Thursday.

Employees known as her by title, making her really feel like extra than simply one other room quantity.

“I nonetheless have nurses that I see that keep in mind me,” Meyer mentioned. “I don’t suppose you’re going to get that in one other form of nursing residence.”