This story was updated at 11:32 a.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 14.
A Mt. Lebanon senior care provider with roots dating to 1910 is seeking state Department of Health approval to close 180 nursing and personal care home beds by the end of the year.
Staff, residents and families were told this week of plans to close Baptist Homes’ 126-bed skilled nursing unit and 54-bed personal care facility on Castle Shannon Road, displacing 93 residents. All but six to 10 of the facilities’ 135 employees are expected to find other jobs within the system.
Closing a nursing home requires a 60-day notice to residents, but Baptist Senior Family President and CEO Timothy Myers said no firm date had been set as the staff continues to find new places for residents to live. The hope is to have everyone moved before Christmastime.
“We’ve been losing money for the better part of a decade,” Mr. Myers said. “We’ve simply run out of our ability to do that.”
Higher labor costs and flat reimbursement for care were cited as reasons for 17 Pennsylvania nursing homes closing since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, including Charles Morris Home in Squirrel Hill last year. Mr. Myers said they were also factors in Baptist Senior Family’s decision.
Ninety-five percent of the facility’s nursing home residents have Medicaid health insurance, which has increased reimbursement for care by just 5% in the past 20 years, he said.
The annual subsidy for Medicaid residents at Baptist Homes ranged between $3 million and $5 million a year.
“It’s a calculus that doesn’t work for us anymore,” Mr. Myers said.
Baptist Senior Family operates two campuses in the Pittsburgh area, and the closure of the Mt. Lebanon facilities represents two-thirds of the nonprofit’s long-term care beds. A decrease in long-term care beds for rehabilitation services in the region has delayed the discharge of patients from some hospitals, officials have said.
“In keeping with our dedication to our residents, we are providing them with devoted and experienced staff to work one on one with each resident and their representatives to help them choose the best new home for them,” the notice read. “Our caring employees will be offered the opportunity to continue employment within Baptist Senior Family.”
The senior care provider will continue to operate Baptist Manor, a government rent subsidized 100-unit independent living complex at the Mt. Lebanon site.
Baptist Senior Family will also continue to operate Providence Point some 5 miles away in Scott, where the nonprofit has a campus with 63 skilled nursing beds and 56 personal care beds. Both campuses are run as continuing care retirement communities, which promise lifetime housing and medical care in return for monthly fees and, in the case of Providence Point, an entrance deposit.
Providence Point does not accept Medicaid patients.
The Mt. Lebanon campus will be redeveloped to accommodate a new model of senior care, one that increasingly provides health care services in the home, Mr. Myers said. Health insurers and some health systems have been expanding at-home services as part of the emerging trend in long-term care.
“Our buildings are fairly aged,” he said. “Seniors want to be served in their homes. They want services to be brought to them, and they want to stay in their homes as long as they can.”
In 1910, a group of Baptist churches opened the Baptist Orphanage & Home Society of Western Pennsylvania in West Newton before moving to the Mt. Lebanon site five years later. The skilled nursing center was dedicated in 1965.
Providence Point opened in 2009.
Higher labor costs and staff shortages driven by the pandemic were blamed for the closure of 17 nursing homes in Pennsylvania over the past two years, including ones at Butler Memorial and UPMC McKeesport hospitals, along with skilled care units in Peters and Baldwin that were operated by Paramount Health Resources Inc.
A recent survey by the Harrisburg-based Pennsylvania Health Care Association found that 75% of the state’s nursing homes were operating in the red, with inflationary labor costs of temporary staffing a big reason.
Kris B. Mamula: kmamula@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1699
First Published: September 14, 2022, 11:29 a.m.
Updated: September 14, 2022, 3:32 p.m.