The Regulatory Occupations Evaluation Committee (ROEC) was formed due to a law passed by the Indiana General Assembly in 2010 that required an evaluation of the need for and function of every professional licensing agency administered by the State of Indiana. They met a few times in 2011 to evaluate the Health Facility Administrators Board (HFAB), which issues professional licenses to Indiana Health Facility and Residential Care Administrators.

At their most recent meeting, the committee received testimony and recommendations from the Chair of the HFAB, Shelley Rauch, who also is a licensed administrator. The ROEC was interested in hearing about the process by which the HFAB evaluates administrators’ performance via CEU audits and examination of Immediate Jeopardy/Sub-standard Quality Care findings from state and federal facility surveys.  

Mrs. Rauch made several recommendations to the ROEC to improve the HFAB's oversight of Indiana's administrators. The recommendations included:
 

• Designate a compliance officer to the HFAB who would identify and act upon issues identified in state and federal facility surveys;
• Create a compliance fund, funded by an add-on to the HFA licensure fee, in order to provide the HFAB additional resources to provide education, licensee retraining and to fund the recommended compliance officer. The HFAB is only allocated $15,143 per year to operate even though it generates nearly $80,000 in licensure fees each year;
• Require all administrators to report any change of employment to the HFAB in order to monitor excessive employment changes which may indi-cate poor performance;
• Study the regulatory structure regarding the Administrator in Training (AIT) program to remove barriers of entry into the profession.

One of the issues regarding the AIT program is the requests for reduction in hours in certain categories of the AIT by experienced applicants. HOPE, with input from IAHSA, IHCA and INALA, drafted a set of proposed guidelines to assist the HFA board in its decision-making process for granting a waiver for experience. Those recommendations will be considered by the HFA board.