R.I. nursing homes score high

Rhode Island nursing homes have once again scored above the national average on resident and family satisfaction surveys, with 92 percent of residents saying they would recommend their nursing home to others, compared with 88 percent nationally.
Similarly, 92 percent of families would recommend their facilities, versus 86 percent nationally.
The figures come from My InnerView, a national research firm that benchmarks nursing homes against their peers across the country. About 200,000 surveys were administered nationwide, including 1,617 of Rhode Island nursing home residents and 2,172 of families.
The surveys measure consumer satisfaction in 22 areas covering the quality of care, support services and overall environment, as well as the competency of the staff and laundry service. They are considered a good complement to government quality ratings, which tend to focus on regulatory compliance, residents health outcomes, and metrics such as staffing levels.
In a news release, the Rhode Island Health Care Association, which represents mostly for-profit nursing homes and rehabilitation facilities across the state, said the high satisfaction scores are proof of the high quality of care delivered at local nursing homes.
RIHCA also noted that nursing homes continue to improve, embracing a movement called culture change that aims to make facilities more home-like and more focused on residents personal and social needs. But they have also been subjected to budget cuts, with more looming.
Nursing homes have sustained millions of dollars in funding cuts over the past few years, said Virginia Burke, president and CEO of RIHCA. Continued cuts threaten the advances nursing homes have made to restructure themselves as places that people feel are more like home. Seventy-one percent of survey respondents have lived in the facility for a year or more. Would anyone want to live in a hospital that long? Without adequate funding, nursing homes may be forced back to that institutional style of health care delivery, which would erase the tremendous strides that have been made in nursing home reform.
Results of the surveys, along with clinical quality measures, can be found on the R.I. Department of Health Web site.