Racial Disparities in Nursing Home Resident and Staff COVID-19 Vaccination Rates

Objectives. To determine whether staff and resident COVID-19 vaccination rates varied by racial heterogeneity of nursing homes, defined as proportion of residents who are White. Methods. Cross-sectional study using data from the Medicare COVID-19 Nursing Home Database and LTCFocus.org to examine facility-level resident and staff vaccination status. General linear regression models assessed analyses of variance and tests for trend on proportion of residents and staff fully vaccinated as of June 13, 2021 by proportion of White residents in each facility. Results. Over 12,000 (n=12,278) nursing homes provided resident measures and 8,838 reported staff measures. The mean (standard deviation [SD]) resident vaccination rate of nursing homes in the lowest and highest quantiles of White residents was significantly different at 72.74% (20.59%) and 85.65% (16.70%), respectively. Staff vaccination rates of nursing homes in the lowest and highest quantiles of White residents were not significantly different at 58.34% (25.09%) and 56.06% (19.32%), respectively. Conclusions. A higher proportion of White residents per facility was associated with higher resident COVID-19 vaccination rates reflecting continued disparities in quality of care during the pandemic.