Long-term care facility

Health care facility that offers extended nursing care and subacute care services to resident patients whose illness does not require acute care. To participate in the Medicare or Medicaid programs, such a facility must be certified as a skilled nursing facility (SNF) or other nursing facility (NF).

long-term care hospital (LTCH)

1. Facility that treats patients not in an acute phase of illness but who need medical and nursing services not available in nursing homes (e.g., rehabilitation hospital). 2. In the Medicare program, this type of facility is called a short-term acute care hospital . Average inpatient stay is greater than 25 days. Also called long-term hospital and long-term acute care hospital .

Long-term care ombudsman

Advocate (supporter) for nursing home and assisted living facility residents who investigate and work to resolve problems between residents and nursing homes or assisted living facilities. This individual monitors federal and state regulations that pertain to long-term care facilities, provide information to the public about the elderly in facilities, and train volunteers to help with this program. Also called ombudsman . See ombudsman .

Longer term care minimum data set

Core set of screening and assessment elements of the Resident Assessment Instrument (RAI). This assessment system provides a comprehensive, accurate, standardized, reproducible assessment of each long-term care facility resident’s functional capabilities and helps staff to identify health problems. This assessment is performed on every resident in a Medicare and/or Medicaid-certified long-term care facility including private pay.