(Rev. 173, Issued: 11-22-17, Effective: 11-28-17, Implementation: 11-28-17)
§483.70(h) Medical director.
§483.70(h)(1) The facility must designate a physician to serve as medical director.
§483.70(h)(2) The medical director is responsible for—
DEFINITIONS §483.70(h)
“Medical director” means a physician who oversees the medical care and other designated care and services in a health care organization or facility. Under these regulations, the medical director is responsible for coordinating medical care and helping to implement and evaluate resident care policies that reflect current professional standards of practice.
“Physician/practitioner” (physician assistant, nurse practitioner, clinical nurse specialist) means the individual who has responsibility for the medical care of a resident.
“Current professional standards of practice” refers to approaches to care, procedures, techniques, treatments, etc., that are based on research and/or expert consensus and that are contained in current manuals, textbooks, or publications, or that are accepted, adopted or promulgated by recognized professional organizations or national accrediting bodies.
“Resident care policies” refers to the facility’s overall goals, directives, and governing statements that direct the delivery of care and services to residents consistent with current professional standards of practice.
GUIDANCE §483.70(h)
If the medical director does not hold a valid license to practice in the State where the nursing home is located refer to F839 - §483.70(f) Staff qualifications. The facility must designate a physician to serve as medical director (unless waived per §488.56(b) by CMS).
The facility must identify how the medical director will fulfill his/her responsibilities to effectively implement resident care policies and coordinate medical care for residents in the facility. This may be included in the medical director’s job description or through a separate facility policy. Facilities and medical directors have flexibility on how all the duties will be performed. However, the facility must ensure all responsibilities of the medical director are effectively performed, regardless of how the task is accomplished or the technology used, to ensure residents attain or maintain their highest practicable physical, mental, and psychosocial well-being. For example, some, but not all, duties may be conducted remotely using various technologies (e.g., phone, email, fax, telehealth, etc., that is compliant with all confidentiality and privacy requirements).
It is important that the medical director’s responsibilities require that he/she be knowledgeable about current professional standards of practice in caring for long term care residents, and about how to coordinate and oversee other practitioners.
If the medical director is also an attending physician, there should be a process to ensure there are no concerns with the individual’s performance as a physician (i.e., otherwise, the medical director is monitoring his/her own performance). If there are concerns regarding his/her performance, the facility’s administration should have a process for how to address these situations.
While medical directors who work for multi-facility organizations, such as corporate or regional offices, may be involved in policy development, the facility’s individual policies must be based on the facility’s unique environment and its resident’s needs, and not based on a broad, multi-facility structure.
Although the medical director is not required to sign policies, the facility must be able to show that the development, review, and approval of resident care policies included his/her input.
Medical director responsibilities must include their participation in:
NOTE: Having a designee does not change or absolve the Medical Director’s responsibility to fulfill his or her role as a member of the QAA committee, or his or her responsibility for overall medical care in the facility.
In addition, the medical director responsibilities should include, but are not limited to:
PROCEDURES §483.70(h)
If a deficiency has been identified regarding a resident’s care, also determine if the medical director had knowledge or should have had knowledge of a problem with care, or physician services, or lack of resident care policies and practices that meet current professional standards of practice and failed:
Interview the medical director about his/her:
Interview facility leadership (e.g., Administrator, Director of Nursing, and others as appropriate) about how they interact with the medical director related to the coordination of medical care, the facility’s clinical practices and concerns or issues with other physicians or practitioners.
Also, refer to §483.30 Physician Services for more information.
KEY ELEMENTS OF NONCOMPLIANCE
To cite deficient practice at F841, the surveyor’s investigation will generally show that the facility failed to do any of the following:
Level 1 - Severity 1 does not apply for this regulatory requirement