Nursing Home Quality Report for Professionals
Nursing Care Facility
Deficiency Analysis
HealthGrades developed a unique, proprietary scoring system that translated the Scope and Severity of each
deficiency into a numerical value. To develop this deficiency scoring system, HealthGrades assembled a group of
nursing home professionals, including three nursing home administrators, one physician, four long-term care
ombudsman, one nurse consultant, one insurance broker, one nursing home owner and one nursing home
administrator with experience as a nursing home inspector. Each member of the group was interviewed by a
statistician and asked to classify each level in the Scope and Severity grid with a numeric value.
The following table displays how numeric values were assigned to an alpha character for each level in the
Scope and Severity grid:
Scope
Isolated
Pattern
Widespread
No actual harm with potential
for more than minimal harm
No actual harm with potential
for more than minimal harm
that is not immediate jeopardy
Actual harm that is not
immediate jeopardy
Immediate jeopardy to resident
health or safety
Severity
J
A
D
G
B
C
E
F
H
I
K
L
A low numerical value (represented by the letter "A") indicated a deficiency that was not severe (no actual harm
to the resident) and isolated (involved very few residents) in scope. A high numerical value (represented by the
letter "L") indicated a deficiency that was very severe (actual harm to the resident) and was widespread
throughout the nursing home.
11/10/2005
Page 29
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May not be reprinted or reproduced without permission.
