What the Georgia SQIP is
The Supplemental Quality Incentive Payment is a yearly add-on the Georgia Department of Community Health pays nursing facilities that improve on CMS long-stay quality measures. The legislature funded it in SFY 2022, and CMS approved it in Georgia's state plan (SPA GA 21-0009). SPA GA 24-0012, effective September 13, 2024, set today's method: payment in proportion to how a building's improvement ranks statewide.
It pays improvement and nothing else. A building that holds an excellent rate steady earns nothing for that measure; a building that gets better, from any starting point, can.
How it’s scored
For SFY 2027 (calendar 2026 against 2025) and SFY 2028 (2027 against 2026), the four measures are:
| Long-stay measure | CMS code |
|---|---|
| Residents who lose too much weight | 404 |
| Urinary tract infection | 407 |
| Antipsychotic medication | 481 |
| Falls with major injury | 410 |
DCH compares each building's four-quarter average for the year with its four-quarter average for the year before, from CMS's published data. If the rate went down, the building improved on that measure. Each measure is scored on its own, so a building that improves on one of the four is paid for that one.
To qualify at all, 50% or more of a building's residents must be Medicaid long-term residents, and it must be in good standing with DCH. DCH names the measures for each calendar year by the September 30 before it starts.
How the money is split
DCH's SFY 2026 payment split the pool into four equal parts, one per measure, about $10.9 million each. Within a measure, the improvers are ranked, and the payment is proportional to rank: the most improved building gets the most, and each place down the list gets a step less. For falls in SFY 2026 that step was about $819, across 163 improvers.
| Paid in | For | Total funding |
|---|---|---|
| SFY 2026 | 2025 against 2024 | $43,771,848 |
| SFY 2027 | 2026 against 2025 | $36,253,776 |
Buildings behind on their nursing home provider fee have the payment applied to what they owe.
See your building’s four Georgia measures against the nation.
When your work shows up
Each payment compares two full calendar years. SFY 2027's compares 2026 with 2025, so every quarter of 2026 is in the number, including the one about to start. The state plan pays once a year, by August 31.
The comparison also resets every year: 2026 becomes the base for 2027. A strong year helps this payment and raises the bar for the next.
How SuperQM helps Georgia buildings
All four measures are long-stay MDS measures, and SuperQM computes them from your own charting for the year in progress, next to last year's rate, so you can see which measures are improving and which resident is holding one back. For antipsychotics, CMS's measure now also reads claims; SuperQM computes the MDS side and shows the published figure.
What SuperQM can't tell you is your rank or your dollars ahead of time. Those depend on how much every other Georgia building improves, and DCH publishes them only with the payment. See how SuperQM works.
