In January, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Office of the Inspector General (OIG), Administration for Community Living and Office for Civil Rights issued a stark report (hereafter, the “Joint Report“) on the state of safety and compliance in group homes.

In it, the authors reported safety problems and lack of compliance were widespread and systematic in group homes across 49 states.

Group home safety lapses, the OIG found, are drastically underreported. In Connecticut, for example, OIG inspectors found that 99% of critical incidents at group homes were not reported to state regulators.

In June, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), which oversees the Medicaid-funded Home and Community-Based Services (HCBS) program that reimburses group homes for ongoing care of persons with disabilities, issued the first of what it says will be a series of bulletins outlining new guidance for HCBS recipients’ incident management, investigation and reporting.

“CMS acknowledges that ensuring high quality HCBS to Medicaid beneficiaries is a shared goal,” the agency wrote.

“The information contained here is meant to reaffirm CMS’ commitment to provide necessary technical assistance to states in the development, implementation, and improvement of a quality oversight program,” it advised. “We encourage states to review this information as they look to strengthen their quality assurance system.”

Get the full story here, from DisabilityScoop‘s Shaun Heasley.