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Healthcare Insights

Reviewing skilled nursing facility quality scores

Skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) help patients with short and long-term inpatient stays for post-surgery recovery, physical therapy, rehabilitation, and transitional care from hospitals. Similar to hospital quality metrics, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) publishes star ratings for skilled nursing facilities.

What is included in CMS SNF ratings?

The overall quality rating for SNFs is on a 1-to 5-star scale, and combines results from ratings for:

  • Health inspections
  • Staffing
  • Quality measures

The quality measures include numerous metrics on the health of both short-term and long-term SNF patients that includes tracking of areas such as:

  • Number of hospitalizations per 1,000 resident days
  • Percentage of residents with re-hospitalizations
  • Percentage of residents with outpatient emergency visits
  • Percentage of residents who received flu or pneumonia shots
  • Percentage of residents with pressure ulcers
  • Percentage of residents receiving antipsychotic medication
  • Percentage of residents experiencing falls

What is the average SNF quality score?

We reviewed quality data from the Definitive Healthcare LongTermCareView product for more than 14,500 SNFs in the U.S. and calculated the overall SNF average quality score to be 2.9 stars out of five. This data is sourced from CMS nursing home data, also known as Nursing Home Compare, and is aggregated from the most recent 12-month interval tracked in our database.

The average score for the three main quality ratings are as follows:

  • Health inspections: 2.8 stars
  • Staffing: 2.6 stars
  • Quality measures: 3.6 stars

What state has the highest rated skilled nursing facilities?

SNFs in Alaska and Hawaii have the highest average overall star ratings at 3.6.

Idaho has the highest average health inspection rating of 3.5. Alaska’s average staff rating of 4.4 places it at the top. And Hawaii has the highest SNF quality score of 4.8. All three of the top SNF states have less than 80 SNFs rated.

What state has the lowest rated skilled nursing facilities?

The average overall rating for SNFs in Louisiana is 2.3, the lowest among states.  Wyoming has a health inspection rating of 2.6 on average. Texas has an average 1.5 staffing rating for its nearly 1,200 SNFs. SNFs in Mississippi have an average quality rating of 2.1. Many states in the south have some of the least healthy populations, which could contribute to the complexity of patient cases at these facilities.

SNF average quality score by state

StateNumber of SNFs with ratingsAverage overall ratingAverage health inspection ratingAverage staffing ratingAverage quality ratingExplore dataset
Alabama2232.92.83.23.4Explore
Alaska193.62.84.44.1Explore
Arizona1403.32.92.94.3Explore
Arkansas2152.92.82.83.5Explore
California11263.22.73.14.4Explore
Colorado2073.02.83.03.9Explore
Connecticut2013.02.83.03.6Explore
Delaware413.52.94.04.2Explore
District of Columbia163.52.63.64.6Explore
Florida6973.12.83.03.9Explore
Georgia3552.52.82.12.9Explore
Hawaii423.62.84.04.8Explore
Idaho793.53.03.44.2Explore
Illinois6722.62.72.23.1Explore
Indiana5172.82.82.03.8Explore
Iowa3942.92.83.13.3Explore
Kansas2742.72.73.03.0Explore
Kentucky2752.72.92.52.9Explore
Louisiana2672.32.71.82.4Explore
Maine873.12.73.83.6Explore
Maryland2232.92.82.73.7Explore
Massachusetts3512.92.73.13.6Explore
Michigan4243.12.83.33.9Explore
Minnesota3413.22.93.83.7Explore
Mississippi1812.52.72.92.1Explore
Missouri4942.52.72.13.0Explore
Montana592.82.82.83.6Explore
Nebraska1743.12.83.23.5Explore
Nevada633.12.82.94.0Explore
New Hampshire702.92.73.23.5Explore
New Jersey3483.22.73.04.3Explore
New Mexico662.62.72.53.3Explore
New York6012.92.82.24.0Explore
North Carolina4162.62.82.13.2Explore
North Dakota763.32.94.23.4Explore
Ohio9382.82.81.93.9Explore
Oklahoma2852.72.82.43.0Explore
Oregon1202.92.73.43.7Explore
Pennsylvania6652.92.82.53.7Explore
Rhode Island753.02.83.23.4Explore
South Carolina1872.82.82.93.3Explore
South Dakota843.02.93.13.2Explore
Tennessee3022.72.72.33.5Explore
Texas11692.52.81.53.5Explore
Utah923.42.93.14.4Explore
Vermont353.02.92.93.2Explore
Virginia2782.62.82.13.5Explore
Washington1923.22.73.24.1Explore
West Virginia1162.62.82.52.6Explore
Wisconsin3273.02.83.23.6Explore
Wyoming312.72.62.63.6Explore

Fig. 1. Data is from the Definitive Healthcare LongTermCareView product and sourced from CMS. Accessed June 2023.

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