Illinois nursing home responsiveness requirements

Any facility employee or agent aware of resident abuse or neglect must immediately report it to IDPH and to the administrator, and the administrator must immediately report to the resident's representative and to IDPH; suspected abusers must be barred from resident contact pending investigation.

A facility employee or agent who becomes aware of abuse or neglect of a resident shall immediately report

This is where Illinois puts its hard clock: the facility must notify the IDPH Regional Office by fax or phone within 24 hours of each reportable incident or accident (deaths by phone only), and must send a narrative summary to the Department within seven days.

The facility shall, by fax or phone, notify the Regional Office within 24 hours after each reportable incident or accident.

Requires the facility to contact local law enforcement immediately for physical abuse causing injury by staff, a visitor or another resident, sexual abuse, any crime committed in the facility by a non-resident, and any resident death other than by disease process.

When a resident death has occurred other than by disease processes

The statutory mandated-reporter layer: administrators, agents, employees, physicians, nurses and other listed professionals with reasonable cause to believe a resident was abused or neglected must report immediately, with a written report mailed within 24 hours.

Reports shall also be made in writing deposited in the U.S. mail, postage prepaid, within 24 hours

Requires the facility's advisory physician or medical advisory committee to write policies and procedures for pulmonary, cardiac, traumatic, toxicologic and other medical emergencies, requires accessible emergency equipment, and requires trained staff (generally two BLS-certified staff) on duty at all times.

a portable oxygen kit, including a face mask and/or cannula; an airway; and bag-valve mask manual ventilating device

Sets Illinois minimum direct-care staffing ratios of 3.8 hours per resident per day for skilled care and 2.5 hours for intermediate care, of which at least 25% must be licensed nurse time and at least 10% registered nurse time.

A minimum of 25% of nursing and personal care time shall be provided by licensed nurses

Every resident is entitled to unimpeded, private and uncensored communication by mail, public telephone or visitation, and the administrator must ensure telephones are reasonably accessible.

Every resident shall be permitted unimpeded, private and uncensored communication of his choice by mail, public telephone or visitation.

Illinois' emergency preparedness rule. Every facility must have written disaster-preparedness policies and a plan covering fire-extinguisher training, a posted evacuation-route diagram, sheltering during tornado and severe thunderstorm warnings, and an established means of receiving National Weather Service warnings that is not commercial radio or television. Fire drills quarterly per shift, other disaster drills twice yearly per shift, written evaluation of each drill kept one year. On any disaster requiring hospital, police, fire or coroner response the administrator or designee must give the Department a preliminary report by the nursing home hotline or the Regional Office - within 24 hours if no direct Departmental assistance is needed - with the facility name and location, disaster type, injuries and deaths, unusable beds, damage estimate, assistance needed and other agencies notified, followed by a full written account within seven days. Annually the facility must forward all disaster policies and plans and its emergency water supply agreements to the local health authority and local emergency management agency, give them a description of its emergency electrical power source, update them when it changes, and participate in emergency planning when asked. Note the gap: this is the state's communication and coordination requirement, but Illinois has no 483.73(c)(1)-style requirement to maintain a current contact roster of staff, physicians, other facilities and volunteers.

Annually, each facility shall forward copies of all disaster policies and plans required under this Section to the local health authority and local emergency management agency having jurisdiction.

Requires that each resident have a satisfactory nurse call device, cross-referencing the design standards at Sections 300.2940(g) and 300.3140(e).

Each resident shall have a satisfactory nurse call device.

For new facilities, every resident room must have at least one calling station and every bed a call station; the call must register at the nurses' station and light a visible corridor signal at the resident's door, and call stations with cords reaching to within six inches of the floor are required at resident toilets, baths and showers.

Each resident room shall be served by at least one calling station and each bed shall be provided with a call station.

SCOPE-LIMITED: this sits in Subpart U and applies only to an Alzheimer's special care unit or center, requiring that unit to have a written quality assessment and improvement plan, part of the facility's overall quality assurance plan, with procedures to elicit input from residents, families and representatives; it is not a facility-wide QAPI rule.

A copy of the plan shall be provided to residents, residents' families, or residents' representatives.