The standard measure for capturing quality at nursing homes does not paint an accurate picture of patient safety, and changes are needed to aid residents in their decision making.
That’s according to a new study, published Monday in the November issue of Health Affairs. Researchers took a closer look at data from the Certification and Survey Provider Enhanced Reports (CASPER) and the Nursing Home Compare archives, aiming to see if star ratings accurately represented potential safety dangers at SNFs.
They compared nursing homes’ performance in standard quality measures with six noted patient safety measures — including pressure sores, infections, falls and medication errors. They noted that the relationship was weak between the two measures, “leaving consumers who care about patient safety with little guidance.”
Changes must be made to give potential residents a better sense of the safety landscape, said Daniel Brauner, an associate professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of Chicago and lead author of the study.
“Nursing Home Compare should look more specifically at these safety measures because consumers are quite concerned about those things, for their loved ones,” he told McKnight’s. “The rating system should take these specific safety measures more seriously and make them a bigger part of its methodology.”
Results were gathered using data for the first quarter of 2017 from NHC and CASPER, representing more than 15,600 facilities. They found that, overall, performance on falls and urinary tract infections for long-stay residents, along with pressure sores for short-stay, showed “little meaningful difference” across star ratings. Meanwhile, medication errors and pressure sores for long-stay residents tracked more closely with star ratings, though with a weak correlation.
