Today, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) updated their previous requirements around testing. The
CMS Memo updates the testing summary, including if the facility has the ability to identify close contacts of the individual with COVID-19; the facility can choose to conduct focused testing based on the known close contacts, as well as the levels of COVID-19 community transmission to now include four colors instead of the previous three.
Testing summary changes include:
- Symptomatic individual identified – staff and residents, vaccinated and unvaccinated, with signs or symptoms must be tested.
- Newly identified COVID-19 positive staff or resident in a facility that can identify close contacts – test all staff and residents, vaccinated and unvaccinated, that had high-risk exposure (staff) or close contact (residents) with a COVID-19 positive individual.
- Newly identified COVID-19 positive staff or resident in a facility that is unable to identify close contact – test all staff (assigned to a specific location where the new case occurred) and residents, vaccinated and unvaccinated, facility-wide or at a group level (e.g., unit, floor, or other specific area)
- Routine testing for residents is not generally recommended.
Routine testing intervals by county COVID-19 level of community transmission changes include:
- Low (blue) not recommended for testing of unvaccinated staff
- Moderate (yellow) once a week testing of unvaccinated staff*
- Substantial (orange) twice a week testing for unvaccinated staff*
- High (red) twice a week testing for unvaccinated staff*
- Vaccinated staff do not need to be routinely tested
* Frequency of testing presumes availability of Point of Care testing on-site at the nursing home or where off-site testing turnaround time is <48 hours.