Pennsylvania Medicaid Must Repay $3 Million For Restraint-Training For Nursing Home Staff

The Pennsylvania Department of Human Services (DHS) must repay $3 million to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) for federal Medicaid matching funds paid for providing training to nursing home staff on reducing use of restraints. The state sought reimbursement for the training from 1996 and 2011. The costs of training were determined to be overhead costs not eligible for matching funds rather than general administrative costs that are eligible for matching.

The training program is called the Pennsylvania Restraint Reduction Initiative; it operated from 1996 through October 2017. Kendal Outreach, LLC, supplied the training to nursing home . . .