MS--North Mississippi Medical Center

Our 60 bed acute care hospital in rural Mississippi is licensed for 10 swing beds. Our swing bed program generally involves shorter stays ( 10 days would be an average stay) and when patients require a longer stay, usually a referral is made to a local Medicare nursing home SNF. The proposed regulation change would place an extreme burden on our existing staff and because of the shorter hospital swing bed stays, it would be difficult to gather all the data that would be required on longer verson of MDS. I am familiar with that version of MDS due to previous employment at a Medfcare nursing home. The data collection would be extremely burdensome for a small swing bed program. It would also require revision of our computerized patient charting pathways which would involve additional personnel and expense. With the shortfalls in reimbursement and so many small rural hospitals being in a precarious financial state, swing bed may incur a financial loss and risk elimination at small rural hospitals.