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Advocates Rally for More Spending on Nursing Homes

By Daniel Dullum
Spectrum staff writer

Fearing the worst as California’s state budget problems continue, a coalition of California nursing home operators and workers, residents’ family members and activists rallied at the Capitol on March 30, urging lawmakers to consider their recommendations for a new Medi-Cal funding system.

Ellen Dalrymple, a member of California United for Nursing Home Care, took a 7:30 a.m. flight from Orange County to be there. Her husband, Dick, is in a Santa Ana nursing facility.

“I took care of him for 17 years, and now, he no longer has use of his legs. So he must have other help,” Dalrymple said. “Last year, we helped stop devastating budget cuts that could have closed hundreds of nursing homes. As long as nursing homes remain underfunded, we’re adversely affecting their quality of life and placing residents at risk.”

The group recommended:

• Establishing a new Medi-Cal funding system that reimburses the costs of improving quality of life for nursing home residents.

• More accountability of nursing home operators for the care they provide.

• Increase staffing, so residents receive more care.

• Increase nursing home employees’ pay and benefits to help recruit and retain a stable and experienced workforce.

• Upgrade facilities.

• Prevent nursing home operators with a poor record of providing care from obtaining additional licenses.

Other speakers included Dee Erman, president of the California Retired Teachers Association; Joyce Lewis, a Sacramento nursing home resident’s family member; Gary Passmore of the Congress of California Seniors; Joan Lee of the Gray Panthers of Sacramento; and three certified nursing assistants.

Speakers said the average pay for a certified nurse assistant in California is $10.13 per hour, without health or retirement benefits.

“They’re doing a fine job, but they work so hard,” Dalrymple said of nursing home workers. “A lot of these people can make the same money in fast food. It’s not fair because it’s such a very difficult position.”

Goldie Hamilton, 50, a nursing home worker in Long Beach, appreciated Dalrymple’s sentiments.

“It’s seriously important. I was motivated to come just by senior citizens I work with,” Hamilton said. “We need two CNAs on each run so we’re helping each other. But there’s not enough money.”

Nursing homes rely on taxpayer funding because most patients are covered by the state’s Medi-Cal program or the federal Medicare program. With California’s spending running several billion dollars ahead of its anticipated revenue for the next fiscal year, lawmakers and the governor are considering scaling back Medi-Cal spending, not increasing it as the coalition recommended.

A 2003 report from the California Healthcare Foundation states that the number of Californians age 65 and older will increase from 3.7 million in 2000 to 6 million by 2020. In that same time frame, the 85-and-older frail elderly population is expected to exceed 725,000 by 2020 and 1.7 million by 2040.

California currently has 113,000 nursing home beds. Experts predict that an additional 67,000 will be needed over the next 20 years.

Hamilton sees the importance of quality nursing home care first-hand.

“Many [patients] don’t have families coming in to see them, shave them or take care of them. All they have is us,” Hamilton said. “We’re the ones that love them, care about them, change and feed them, spending our time with them when we have a couple of days off.”

Hamilton said she isn’t experiencing burnout, but that she has noticed a significant burnout factor in nursing home workers.

“They’re doing what I can’t do, so I appreciate it so much,” Dalrymple said. “But the government has to appreciate it as well.”

Dalrymple would like to see the state hold off cutting back on reimbursements to nursing facilities.

“All we can do is work hard towards that goal. It’s so important. We’re all going to have elderly people in our lives that need care,” Dalrymple said. “Write to your congressmen, send e-mails, make telephone calls, don’t let them forget us, because us will be you.”

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