Additional Medicare nursing home ownership data is being made publicly available by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) through the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). This effort may help improve nursing home transparency, safety and quality, and accountability by providing more information about the ownership of all Medicare-certified nursing homes.
This data will, for the first time, give state licensing officials, state and federal law enforcement, researchers, and the public an enhanced ability to identify common owners of nursing homes across nursing home locations. This information can be linked to other data sources to identify the performance of facilities under common ownership, such as owners affiliated with multiple nursing homes with a record of poor performance.
The data file will be posted to data.cms.gov and updated monthly to help researchers, states, regulators, and others analyze how ownership of particular nursing homes or groups of nursing homes impacts the quality of care nursing home residents receive.
Officials said the CMS data is part of the Biden administration’s effort to shine a light on an industry that receives substantial federal funding. The new ownership information follows a data release in April on more than 3,000 nursing homes that changed ownership through mergers or purchases since 2016.
The data includes information on about 15,000 nursing homes certified by Medicare and Medicaid. These homes are subject to annual inspections, called surveys. However, consumers have been unable to track whether homes are owned by a group or a management company with a history of poor performance.
The new data includes information about each home’s owner as well as whether it’s part of a larger chain or consulting firm. The data will include fields that show groups of nursing homes with common owners and management groups.
To view the new CMS nursing home ownership information, click here.