What the New Jersey QIPP is
The Nursing Facility Quality Incentive Payment Program adds dollars to a building's Medicaid rate, per resident per day, for each quality benchmark it meets. The Division of Aging Services runs it with the Division of Medical Assistance and Health Services, inside the Department of Human Services. It started in Fiscal Year 2020 and was rebuilt around staffing for FY 2025.
The metrics and the dollars are written into each year's Appropriations Act. The FY 2027 act, approved June 30, 2026, sets seven of them. The add-ons are in the rate from July 1, 2026, and each fiscal year every building starts again from a clean slate.
The seven metrics
There are no points and no ranking. Each metric is a line, and a building that clears it earns that metric's add-on. For the MDS and hospitalization metrics, the line is the New Jersey or national average, whichever is harder to meet.
| Metric (FY 2027) | Line | Per Medicaid day |
|---|---|---|
| Nurse staffing hours, adjusted | 4.10 or more | $7.50 |
| Nurse staffing hours, adjusted | State average (3.74) to 4.09 | $5.25 |
| Staffing improvement | Up 0.5% on the prior year, 3.60 to 4.09 | $2.00 |
| Nursing staff turnover | 30% or less | $5.25 |
| Long-stay residents who lose too much weight (MDS) | 4.55% or less | $2.50 |
| Long-stay residents with pressure ulcers (MDS) | 5.06% or less | $2.50 |
| Hospitalizations per 1,000 long-stay days (claims) | 1.89 or less | $2.50 |
| CoreQ resident and family survey | 85% or more | $2.50 |
The staffing, turnover and MDS lines are the simple average of four quarters of CMS data: Q4 2024 through Q3 2025 for FY 2027. Hospitalizations used Q3 2024 through Q2 2025. A quarter CMS shows as missing fails the metric. The weight loss measure is CMS 404, and the pressure ulcer measure is CMS 479, the one that counts every long-stay resident.
What it pays, and who is ruled out
The add-ons stack. The most a building can add is $22.75 per Medicaid day: $7.50 for staffing at 4.10 hours, $5.25 for turnover and $2.50 for each of the other four. The $2.00 improvement add-on is only for buildings under 4.10 hours, so it can't sit on top of the $7.50.
In the FY 2027 results, 248 of the 370 facilities on DHS's list were eligible. They averaged about $9.24 a day, and the most any of them earned was $20.25. Weight loss paid 138 of the 248, and pressure ulcers 110.
A one-star rating isn't a smaller payment. It is no payment. A building is out of the whole program for the year if, in the last calendar year, CMS gave it an overall one-star rating, it was on the Special Focus Facility lists, or the Department of Health cited it for two or more Level G or higher deficiencies. It is also out if it doesn't file the CoreQ sample size form on time. 93 of the 370 were flagged for a one-star rating in 2025.
See your building’s stars and every long-stay measure against the nation.
What SuperQM covers, honestly
The two MDS measures are $5.00 of the $22.75, about 22%. SuperQM scores both from your own charting, for the quarter you're in, against New Jersey's lines, and names the residents behind each one. It also computes your CMS quality measure points and star, one of the three parts of the overall rating that decides whether you are in the program at all.
Staffing and turnover, $12.75 of the maximum, come from CMS's Payroll-Based Journal. SuperQM shows the scorecard CMS publishes, about two quarters behind. It isn't a live staffing forecast. Hospitalizations come from Medicare claims, so SuperQM shows CMS's published figure. CoreQ is a survey SuperQM doesn't run. See how SuperQM works.
When your work shows up
FY 2027 paid on Q4 2024 through Q3 2025, so a quarter of care reached the rate about nine months after it ended, and stayed there for the year. If FY 2028 follows the same pattern, it will read Q4 2025 through Q3 2026. DHS opened the FY 2028 cycle on September 23, 2026 with the CoreQ sample size form, due October 16, and says the metrics and dollars are subject to change until the FY 2028 budget is final.
