Under the ACA, long term care facilities must submit information about staff working in direct care. This includes agency and contract staff. Direct care staff are defined by the CMS as anyone that uses interpersonal contact or is involved in residential care management to provide care and services that allows the recipients to attain or maintain the highest achievable mental, physical, and psychological health and well-being.
Nursing homes
Quarterly, as follows:
Submissions must be received by the end of the 45th calendar day (11:59 PM Eastern Standard Time) after the last day in each fiscal quarter to be considered timely.
The PBJ system allows participating companies to submit data:
PBJ information may be entered into the Internet Quality Improvement and Evaluation System (iQIES).
Note: Beginning in 2020, iQIES will replace and consolidate functionality from the QIES, CASPER and ASPEN legacy systems.
Questions regarding the PBJ policy information should be directed to nhstaffing@cms.hhs.gov.
CMS established a tech-support email for any questions when formatting your .XML, which is: NursingHomePBJTechIssues@cms.hhs.gov.
Potential loss of CMS reimbursement for not reporting. Affects star rating on Nursing Home Compare.
Note: Check your CASPER reports to help ensure data is submitted accurately.
Section 6106 of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) requires facilities to electronically submit direct care staffing information (including agency and contract staff) based on payroll and other auditable data.
CMS has defined 40 job descriptions that each have a Labor Category Code and Job Title Code. Staffing hours need to be reported per day per individual staff member under the correct labor category and job title codes.
All of the staffing categories and job titles can be found in the CMS Long Term Care Policy Manual in Table 1.
There are several data points required for each individual registered employee:
The information required for direct care workers are: