Nursing Assistant Certified Reimbursement Program

Attention NAC Preparers

Guidance on the NAC Program, as well as the new email address that will need to be used for submitting NAC reimbursement packets, can be found in Dear Administrator letter #2021-004.

Nursing Assistant Certification Reimbursement is a federal requirement for all nursing facilities with a Medicaid/Medicare contract. As part of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1987, Medicare and Medicaid regulations were amended to require certification of nursing assistants employed by participating facilities. If you have any questions about the Nursing Assistant Certification training reimbursement program, please contact the NAC Lead, Jill Ramos, at Jill.Ramos@dshs.wa.gov or (360) 725-2514, or the Nursing Facility Rates Manager, Tiffany Hills, at (360) 995-2809 or Tiffany.Hills@dshs.wa.gov.

NOTE: All facilities with a Medicaid contract must offer reimbursement to NAC students, provided that the nursing facility is the first one the student works at within a year of completing their training and their training wasn’t paid for with a scholarship or some other form of public funding. Medicaid-contracted facilities are required to reimburse graduates 100% for books, supplies, tuition, and testing fees when the nursing assistant presents a receipt clearly showing payment for the item or service.

Reimbursement to nursing facilities by the department

At DSHS, we refer to our NATCEP reimbursement program as the Nursing Assistant Certification reimbursement program. This program reimburses facilities for the Medicaid proportion of NA education costs incurred by the facilities. Reimbursement requests must be submitted to DSHS on the current forms and emailed securely by the appropriate quarterly due date to DSHSALTSANACReimbursement@dshs.wa.gov. The NAC reimbursement program covers the following components:

All costs associated with the training coursework.
Fees for textbooks or other required course materials.
Administration fees for competency examination and re-testing examinations, if necessary, either both parts or just the written/oral or just the skills portion of the examination.
The NAC reimbursement program does NOT reimburse for DOH licensing fees.
LATE PACKETS WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED.

The submission deadline schedule is as follows:

1st Quarter: July 31st (processed with 2nd quarter to accommodate the cost report review)

2nd Quarter: July 31st

3rd Quarter: October 31st

4th Quarter: January 31st the following year (example - the quarter ending Dec. 31, 2026, would be due by Jan. 31, 2027)

The NAC reimbursement program run by the Department of Social and Health Services does not reimburse students directly; the program only reimburses nursing facilities.

If you are a NAC student or potential NAC student, you must contact the nursing facilities in your area to find out about their specific reimbursement programs. Please see the currently approved list of Washington State facilities with a Medicaid contract here.

If you are a student or potential student and have questions about the Nursing Assistant training program, please visit the Residential Care Services NATCEP Nursing Assistant program website.

The NAC reimbursement program run by the Department of Social and Health Services does not provide Nursing Assistant (NA) Training. All NA training programs are provided by outside entities which are certified by the Department of Health (DOH). Please see the currently approved list of Nursing Assistant Training Programs here.

If you are a facility that would like to become a Nursing Assistant Training Program, please visit the Department of Health Nursing Assistant Certified – Education Forms website.

If you are a facility that would like to become a Nursing Assistant Training Program and have questions about the program, please visit the Department of Health Nursing Assistant Certified – Education Information for Programs website.