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NY Nursing Homes See Overnight Surge In Employee COVID Vaccinations Thanks To State Mandate
By
Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky
and
Caroline Lewis
Published Oct 1, 2021
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Seth Wenig/AP/Shutterstock
By
Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky
and
Caroline Lewis
Published Oct 1, 2021
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Going into this week, Leonardo Vicente was preparing for the worst.
New York’s hospital and nursing home employees were mandated to receive at least one COVID-19 vaccine shot by Monday, September 27th to keep their jobs. But ahead of the deadline, barely half—56%—of the staff at the Highbridge Woodycrest Center, the nursing home Vicente runs in the Bronx, had done so.
Highbridge has a five-star rating from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which keeps track of the quality of care in nursing homes around the country, and is well-staffed compared to many other facilities in the area. But it was facing a huge exodus of employees under the mandate. Functioning with nearly half the staff out would be difficult, but Vicente figured he’d be able to weather the storm.
“We ran this facility at 50% during the pandemic,” he said, due to some illnesses, some people caring for kids at home, sick relatives and other typical calamities of pandemic life.
Then something miraculous happened: People who had previously refused to get a shot came into the office holding out their vaccination cards. Another nine employees opted to get their first dose at an onsite vaccine clinic offered this week. Ultimately, only four of the 120 employees at the facility declined to get vaccinated, and one got a medical exemption. By Wednesday, Highbridge’s vaccination rate had risen to near perfect, 98.6%.
This scenario has played out across New York state, quieting fears that the vaccine mandate would exacerbate existing staffing issues at nursing homes and put their residents at risk. The at-least-one-dose vaccination rate among nursing home employees statewide went from 84% the week before the mandate took effect to 97% as of September 30th. Along with the mandate, outreach and vaccine education likely contributed to the uptick.
In New York City and its surrounding areas, more than a dozen nursing homes recorded rates that rose 20 percentage points or more in just five days.
In Manhattan and Staten Island, nursing homes have managed to get 99% of staff vaccinated, while the other boroughs have reached 98%, according to state data. Westchester has recorded a similar rise.
State officials confirmed to WNYC/Gothamist that the boosts in vaccine coverage are due to shots being taken rather than staff being fired.
State officials confirmed the boosts in vaccine coverage are due to shots being taken rather than staff being fired.
At some individual homes, staff vaccination rates skyrocketed in just a few days. Hopkins Center for Rehabilitation and Healthcare, a severely understaffed nursing home in Brooklyn, reported that just 61% of its employees were at least partially vaccinated two days before the mandate. By September 29th, that figure had risen to 99%. The Plaza Rehab and Nursing Center in the Bronx and Oceanview Nursing & Rehabilitation Center in Queens saw similar gains.
“We are hearing of a significant uptick in vaccination rates and, at least anecdotally, not as many cases of staff leaving as the industry was reporting that it feared,” said Richard Mollot, executive director of the Long Term Care Community Coalition, which advocates on behalf of residents of long-term care facilities in New York state.
In the weeks leading up to the mandate taking effect, industry leaders had been sounding the alarm about potential workforce shortages. Some nursing home administrators prepared to winnow down patient admissions and wrote up emergency staffing plans so they could manage without unvaccinated employees.
“As we got closer to the vaccine mandate [deadline], we were really concerned,” said Stephen Hanse, president and CEO of the New York State Health Facilities Association, which represents nursing homes. “Then it was just around-the-clock educating staff as to the safety and efficacy of the vaccines leading up to the 27th, and we kept seeing the numbers increase.”
Read More: SUNY Hospitals Cancel Surgeries, Other Services Due To Vaccine Holdouts
Still, Hanse noted that in some cases, losing even a couple of staff members could have consequences for patient care, depending on who leaves. “You could have a nursing home with four nurses on the night shift,” he said. “Say one or two choose not to be vaccinated, that’s a 25% or 50% staff cut. That’s tremendous.”
Despite the massive increase in vaccination rates in nursing homes overall, some facilities in the city and surrounding areas still have rates below 90%. If they continue to remain stagnant, they could lose a significant chunk of their staff next week and beyond.
At Luxor Nursing and Rehabilitation in Suffolk County, for example, about 12% of staff remain unvaccinated even after the September 27th deadline. And it already carries the lowest possible staffing rating from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which ranks homes on their ratios of nurses and aides to residents.
Because staffing is already so lean, many nursing home administrators had their unvaccinated employees working right up until the deadline, Hanse explained. Now that the deadline has passed, rather than firing employees who haven’t complied, some administrators are giving them a 30-day unpaid leave of absence in hopes that they’ll change their minds. Last weekend, Gov. Kathy Hochul eliminated unemployment insurance benefits for health care workers who were terminated for noncompliance with the mandate.
“Will we ever see a 100% vaccination rate?” Hanse asked. “That will be difficult. It’s what we strive for, but it is an individual and personal choice.”
Tagged
COVID-19
new york city
vaccine mandate
new york
nursing home
Governor Kathy Hochul
vaccine hesitancy
Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky
Jaclyn is a former Gothamist reporter.
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Caroline Lewis
Caroline Lewis is on the health care beat for WNYC and Gothamist. She has covered COVID, a nurses' strike, the overdose crisis and New York’s marijuana legalization effort, and spent a year investigating patients' medical bills. She always wants to hear about how everyday New Yorkers experience the health system. Got a tip? Email [email protected].
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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