Thirteen Presbyterian Manors of Mid-America senior living communities are on the U.S. News and World Report Best Nursing Homes 2018-2019 list. The communities received the High Performing rating to make the list, available today.

PMMA locations on the honoree list with five-star ratings are Aberdeen Village (Olathe), Emporia, Lawrence, Newton, Parsons, Salina, Sterling, Topeka and Wichita in Kansas and Aberdeen Heights (Kirkwood), Farmington, Fulton and Rolla in Missouri.

Inclusion on the list is confirmation of the campuses’ commitment to PMMA’s mission to provide quality senior services guided by Christian values.

The U.S. News and Report list uses information from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the government agency that sets and enforces standards for nursing homes. CMS assigns one to five stars to each community for how well it performs in health inspections, nurse staffing and level of quality care.

Survey teams from the state conduct inspections in each community every 12 to 15 months. The surveys cover a checklist of about 180 items such as medication management, food preparation and delivery, proper paperwork and resident enrichment activities.

More than 4,300 nursing homes received CMS' top rating of five stars, while just 1,844 nursing homes earned the top Overall rating issued by U.S. News, according to the U.S. News website.

All Medicare- and Medicaid-certified health care centers were evaluated by U.S. News. To be eligible for an overall rating, a center must have received an overall star rating from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in July 2018 and a staffing star rating in either April or July 2018.

The U.S. News Overall ratings assign each eligible nursing home a rating of High Performing, Better than Average, Average, Worse than Average or Poor. U.S. News now uses the CMS star rating for staffing rather than the overall star rating to determine which communities are given the High Performing designation. This decision reflects expert opinion on the importance of staffing in quality of care, as well as the availability since April 2018 of more accurate data on nurse staffing levels in each community or center.

New this year is a Short-Stay Rehabilitation rating evaluating the care delivered to patients after a hospitalization for surgery, heart attack, stroke or similar condition. To be eligible for a short-stay rating, a center's performance on at least one outcome measure and data on either physical therapy time or RN and total nurse staffing must have been available from CMS. Outcome measures included the percentages of short-stay patients who were rehospitalized within 30 days, had an emergency room visit within 30 days and were successfully discharged to their home or community.

Topeka and Wichita in Kansas and Farmington in Missouri were named High Performing in the new Short-Stay category. The three were among 736 communities that received the High Performing designation in both categories.

“Presbyterian Manors of Mid-America employees continue to focus their efforts on the mission of delivering quality senior services and care every day,” said PMMA President and CEO Bruce Shogren. “The designation from U.S. News and World Report confirms their good work.”

To learn more about the U.S. News and World Report rating system, visit their FAQ page.

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