White Oak Manor - Lancaster

With an address in Lancaster, South Carolina, White Oak Manor - Lancaster is one of a mere two nursing homes in the city. This nursing home received an A- overall, which is an elite score. We were so impressed with this nursing home that we ranked it in the top 25 percent of all nursing homes in the country. The best part of this nursing home's impressive profile is its inspection reports. Inspection reports are discussed in the next section

We also wanted to point out the fact that this nursing home earned near flawless health inspections recently. We awarded them an A+ in this category. Inspection grades account for a host of factors found on a nursing home's inspection reports. One key criteria we weigh heavily is the number and severity of deficiencies. Nursing homes with better grades in this category tend to have few of these severe deficiencies. While this place had a few minor dings on its report, it had no severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are labeled as categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This tells you that CMS did not deem any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient health or safety. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

Adding to its first-rate performance in other areas, we awarded this facility a score of A for its long-term care score. When nursing homes receive this kind of score in this category it is usually a good sign for patient care and suggests that the facility is well-staffed with nurses aids. After assessing the quantity of care provided by aids and other staff, we next considered the nursing home's vaccination data. This nursing home vaccinated 98.46154 percent of its residents against pneumonia, which is significantly higher than most nursing homes. This nursing home was also able to keep its residents out of the hospital. It had just 1.46 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days.

This facility also excelled in the area of nursing, where it received a grade of A-. Few nursing homes performed better in this area. Our nursing grade is mostly based on a facility's nurse staffing. With 4 hours of nursing care per resident per day, this nursing home surpassed the national average. Lastly, this facility was also above average in each of the major quality-based metrics we looked at in this category. For example, it performed well in the area of minimizing its residents' major falls and pressure ulcers. These areas are generally reliable indicators of the quality of nursing care a nursing home provides.

The final area we scored is short-term care, in which this facility received a grade of B-. This actually ended up being this nursing home's worst area. This is still not a bad grade. In computing our short-term care grades, we assess the nursing home's levels of highly skilled nursing, which includes registered nurses, physical therapists respiratory therapists and other highly trained professionals. This score is more often than not a useful assessment of the facility's rehabilitation services. Fortunately, this nursing home offers both physical therapists and registered nurses. Not all facilities offer both. The final datapoint we looked at in this category is the percentage of patients who were able to leave the facility and return to the community. We discovered that just 41.2 percent of this facility's residents were able to return home, which is actually below average.