Oregon · nursing homes
Oregon nursing home staff requirements: what you have to hold on every person
An Oregon nursing home has to hold thirty dated things on file for the people it employs. Twenty-eight of them are federal and are the same in every state. Two are Oregon's own, and the first of them repeats every two years on a wider group of people than most buildings expect.
What Oregon adds
Two things, on top of everything every nursing home in the country already holds. Each one names the section of Oregon law it comes from, so you can read it yourself rather than take our word for it.
| What we track | How often | Where the rule comes from |
|---|---|---|
| A background check through the state Background Check Unit for anybody with access to residentsAccess to residents is the test, not payroll. A contractor who works unsupervised on the floor is inside this, and a volunteer who sits with residents is too. | Every 2 years | OAR 407-007-0220 |
| Sixteen hours of teaching a year for staff in a memory care unit, four of them on dementiaThis attaches to the unit rather than the building. If you do not run a memory care unit, this row is not needed for your people. | Every year, for staff assigned to that unit | OAR 411-057-0155 |
Access, not payroll
Oregon writes its background check rule around who can reach a resident, and almost every building organizes its files around who is on the payroll. Those two groups are not the same, and the difference is where the gap lives.
The agency nurse covering nights. The physiotherapist who comes in twice a week under contract. The hospice team. The volunteer who reads to people on Sunday afternoons. Every one of those has access to residents, none of them appears in your payroll run, and every one of them is inside a rule that repeats every two years.
Two years is also long enough that nobody remembers the first one. A contractor who started in March of one year has a date in March two years later, and nothing about the second date announces itself.
What Oregon does not add
Oregon does not set a teaching hour count for nurse aides outside memory care. It keeps a certification alive through paid working hours instead, which is a measure your scheduling system knows about and your training records do not.
Oregon does not write its own TB schedule. It follows the national approach and leaves the detail to your plan.
What every nursing home in the country holds
These twenty-eight are the same in Oregon as they are everywhere else, and they are most of the job. Each one names a CMS tag, a piece of the federal code, or both. The guides go through the ones that get cited most.
Licences and certificates
| What we track | How often | Where the rule comes from |
|---|---|---|
| A current RN license | When it runs out. Most last 2 years. | F839 · 42 CFR 483.70(e) |
| A current LPN license | When it runs out. Most last 2 years. | F839 · 42 CFR 483.70(e) |
| Nurse aide certification, still active on the state list | When it runs out. Most last a year. | F728 · 42 CFR 483.35(d) |
| A current license for therapy, social work and pharmacy staff | When it runs out. Most last 2 years. | F839 · 42 CFR 483.70(e) |
| A current administrator license | When it runs out. Most last a year. | F836 · 42 CFR 483.70(a) |
| Proof the food service director is qualified, where no dietitian works full time | When it runs out. Most last 3 years. | F801 · 42 CFR 483.60(a)(2) |
| Proof the activities lead is qualified | When it runs out. Most last 2 years. | F680 · 42 CFR 483.24(c)(2) |
Checks you run on a person
| What we track | How often | Where the rule comes from |
|---|---|---|
| A look at the state nurse aide list before the first shift | Before their first shift, then every 2 years | F729 · 42 CFR 483.35(d)(4) |
| A check for any finding of abuse or neglect against them | Every year | F606 · 42 CFR 483.12(a)(3) |
Health and safety
| What we track | How often | Where the rule comes from |
|---|---|---|
| A first TB check: history, symptoms and a test | Once, in their first two weeks | CDC 2019 via 42 CFR 483.80(a)(2) |
| The hepatitis B shot offered free, and their answer written down | Once, within ten working days of starting | 29 CFR 1910.1030(f) |
| A mask fit test for anyone who wears an N95 | When it runs out. Most last a year. | 29 CFR 1910.134(f) |
| A current CPR card at the healthcare level | When it runs out. Most last 2 years. | F678 · 42 CFR 483.24(a)(3) |
Teaching and in-service
| What we track | How often | Where the rule comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Orientation, before they work on their own | Once, in their first week | F940 · 42 CFR 483.95 |
| Teaching on abuse, neglect and dementia care | Every year | F943 · 42 CFR 483.95(c) |
| Teaching on residents' rights | Every year | F942 · 42 CFR 483.95(b) |
| Teaching on stopping infection spreading | Every year | F945 · 42 CFR 483.95(e) |
| Teaching on the quality program | Every year | F944 · 42 CFR 483.95(d) |
| Teaching on the compliance and ethics program, if your company runs five or more buildings | Every year | F946 · 42 CFR 483.95(f) |
| Teaching on mental health and behavior needs | Every year | F949 · 42 CFR 483.95(i) |
| Teaching on talking with residents, for hands-on staff | Every year | F941 · 42 CFR 483.95(a) |
| Teaching on what to do in an emergency | Every year | 42 CFR 483.73(d)(1) |
| Teaching on blood and needle safety | Every year | 29 CFR 1910.1030(g) |
| Teaching on the chemicals they handle | When they start, and again when a new chemical arrives | 29 CFR 1910.1200(h) |
| Twelve hours of teaching for each nurse aide | 12 hours every year, counted from their own start date | F947 · 42 CFR 483.95(g) |
| A written look at how each nurse aide is doing | Every year | F730 · 42 CFR 483.35(d)(7) |
| Teaching on keeping resident information private | When they start, and again whenever your privacy policy changes | 45 CFR 164.530(b)(1) |
Employment paperwork
| What we track | How often | Where the rule comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Form I-9, filled in and kept | Once, in their first three days of work | 8 CFR 274a.2(b)(1)(ii) |
Three more that nearly every building does anyway
These three are not on the tables above, and the reason is narrow: they rest on federal guidance or on a reporting program rather than on a rule with a section number. Almost every nursing home does all three, several state Medicaid programs have made the first one a condition of payment, and a page that called them law would be a page a surveyor would stop trusting.
- A check against the federal list of people barred from Medicare and Medicaid work. Every month. A name that was clear in January can be on it in February, so this is one to run on employees and contractors alike.
- Teaching on the signs of TB. Every year. What the signs are, who is at risk, and what to do about it. Teaching, not a test.
- A flu shot, or their reason for saying no. Every year. Their answer either way, written down. The count of who said yes is what goes in the yearly report.
What you still have to check yourself
Real in Oregon, and not on the tables above, because we could not put a section number next to them without guessing. Guessing at a citation is worse than admitting the gap, because the guess is the thing somebody quotes back.
- The 400 paid hours over two years that keep an Oregon nurse aide certification current. The Oregon State Board of Nursing sets it. We could not pin it to a section number, so it is not in the table above.
- The yearly TB risk review your building runs. Oregon follows the national 2019 approach and leaves the detail to your own infection control plan, so the answer for your building is in that plan.
Where the Oregon rows came from
Read on .
Questions Oregon buildings ask
How often does Oregon re-run a background check?
Every two years, through the state Background Check Unit, for anybody with access to residents. That is one of only three states in this set that comes back around at all, and the group it covers is wider than payroll, so a contractor working unsupervised and a volunteer sitting with residents are both inside it.
Do volunteers need an Oregon background check?
If they have access to residents, treat them as inside it. The rule is written around access rather than around employment, which is the opposite of how most buildings organize their files, and it is the most common way an Oregon building ends up short.
What are the Oregon memory care training hours?
Sixteen hours a year for staff assigned to a memory care unit, with four of them on dementia specifically. It attaches to the unit and not to the building, so a nursing home without a memory care unit does not carry it and should not pretend to.
Does Oregon set a nurse aide training hour count?
Not in hours of teaching. Oregon keeps a certification current through 400 paid working hours over two years, which is a different kind of measure entirely and does not show up as a training date. The federal twelve hours a year still apply on top.
Does Oregon require an annual TB test?
No. Oregon follows the national 2019 approach and hands the detail to your building's own risk review, which means your infection control plan is the document that answers this. It also means the plan needs to say something specific, because it is what a surveyor reads.
Where to go next
- How Credolex works in a nursing home
- F730: annual in-service hours, the guide behind the tag Oregon leans on
- What Washington asks for
- What California asks for
- What Illinois asks for
- Every state we have read so far