CMS NEWS
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 22, 2020
Trump
Administration Launches New Toolkit to Help States Navigate COVID-19 Health
Workforce Challenges
At President Trump’s direction, the Centers for
Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Assistant Secretary of
Preparedness and Response (ASPR) released a new toolkit to help state and
local healthcare decision makers maximize workforce flexibilities when
confronting 2019 Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) in their communities. This
toolkit includes a full suite of available resources to maximize
responsiveness based on state and local needs, building on President
Trump’s commitment to a COVID-19 response that is locally executed, state
managed, and federally supported. This work was developed by the Healthcare
Resilience Task Force as part of the unified government’s response to
COVID-19.
“The
Administration has taken swift and unprecedented emergency action to lift
regulatory constraints, ease federal rules and approve waivers that help
local hospitals, clinics and other healthcare facilities boost their
frontline medical staffs and increase their ability to care of patients in
the face of crisis. This new resource will help states apply all of these
important changes on the ground in order to maximize their workforce to
ensure care for patients,” said CMS Administrator Seema Verma.
In response
to this pandemic, the Trump Administration has provided sweeping
flexibility to the U.S. healthcare system. To bolster the healthcare
workforce, barriers for hiring and retaining of physicians, nurses, and
other healthcare professionals to keep staffing levels high have been
removed. Medical practitioners are now able to practice at the top of their
license and across state lines, offering more flexibility for rural
providers and expanding the available workforce. CMS has also allowed
additional healthcare providers to enroll in Medicare temporarily to
provide care during the public health emergency. Finally, an unprecedented
expansion of telehealth services covered by Medicare, allows patients to
have doctor’s visits at home, no matter where they live, to reduce
potential exposure to the virus.
The COVID-19 Healthcare Workforce Toolkit builds
on the steps CMS has taken to ensure healthcare facilities across the
nation are fully staffed and equipped to treat COVID-19 patients as
efficiently as possible. This comprehensive toolkit for individuals
managing workforces during the COVID-19 pandemic provides helpful
information on funding flexibilities, liability protections, and workforce
training all in one place. For example, state and local communities will be
able to access the COVID-19 Healthcare Workforce Toolkit to see how and
where workforce waivers can be applied based on information from other
areas.
The COVID-19 Healthcare Workforce Toolkit also
provides up-to-date best practices so that state and local healthcare
decision makers have a go-to resource to know what’s been implemented in
the field and to find out how it’s working. The toolkit is available online
and includes an assistance center, information exchange of case studies and
additional peer-to-peer communications that can be used to help local
communities determine the best way to battle the COVID-19 based on their
unique needs.
The Healthcare Workforce Toolkit is housed on the
ASPR Technical Resources, Assistance Center, and Information Exchange
(TRACIE). ASPR TRACIE is a healthcare emergency preparedness information
gateway that ensures all stakeholders—at the federal, state, local, tribal,
and territorial government levels; in nongovernmental organizations; and in
the private sector—have access to information and resources to improve
preparedness, response, recovery, and mitigation efforts. The
platform helps to fill gaps in healthcare system preparedness by providing
timely, innovative ways to share information and promising practices during
planning efforts.
The COVID-19 Healthcare Workforce Toolkit are
part of the ongoing White House Coronavirus Task Force efforts. To keep up
with the important work the Task Force is doing in response to COVID-19,
visit www.coronavirus.gov. For
a complete and updated list of CMS actions, and other information specific
to CMS, please visit the Current
Emergencies Website.
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