Government to Grade Nursing Homes on Tougher Scale

Starting immediately, the federal government is making it harder for nursing homes to get top grades on a public report card, in part by increasing scrutiny of their use of anti-psychotic drugs and raising the bar on an array of quality measures.

Those grades—in the form of 1- to 5-star ratings—are part of Nursing Home Compare, a government website to help consumers evaluate nursing homes. While the star ratings, which debuted in December 2008, are lauded as an important tool, critics say they rely too heavily on self-reported data and allow a majority of homes to score high ratings.

Read more at Kaiser Health News: http://bit.ly/1DNAUcd