How good are Beaufort County nursing homes? New report ranks them from best to worst

Six Beaufort County nursing homes just received new ratings, and they’re scattered across the board in terms of quality.

U.S. News & World Report released a list last week of the best nursing homes across the country.

Two Beaufort County facilities, Broad Creek Care and The Preston Health Center, earned a “Top Performing” grade. Fraser Health Center on Hilton Head Island and NHC Healthcare in Okatie were labeled as “Average.” Meanwhile, Life Care Center of Hilton Head was rated “Below Average” and Bayview Manor was labeled the lowest grade, “Poor.”

Bayview Manor is a Beaufort, for-profit nursing home owned by the parent company Epic Group Limited that sleeps up to 170 people.

Medicare, which also ranks nursing homes, gave Bayview Manor a one-star rating — the lowest possible grade — in its most recent report.

Joe Lee, Epic’s regional director of operations in South Carolina, said the nursing home is in a “period of transition.”

Lee, who has served as the home’s interim administer since August, has worked to increase Bayview Manor’s staffing, improve staff morale and recently hired a new administrator and nursing director, he said.

“It’s obvious we haven’t been a star performer, but things are changing here, so stay with us because I think you’ll see a gradual improvement,” Lee said. “The changes won’t happen overnight, but we can certainly affect the care and atmosphere in the building in short order, and I think that is already happening.

“We’re going to make this community proud of us.”

U.S. News & World Report, a digital news and information company that provides consumer advice, rankings and analysis, started publishing online ratings of nursing homes in 2009 and evaluated more than 15,000 homes across the country this year.

Each home was graded on state-conducted health inspections, nurse staffing and medical quality measures, and more emphasis was placed on strong performance in medical quality measures, according to the report.

In South Carolina, 183 nursing homes were graded for the report, 15 percent of which earned the best grade and 13 percent earned the worst.

“Selecting the right nursing home that offers exceptional care for a loved one can be particularly challenging,” says Ben Harder, managing editor and chief of health analysis. “For the Best Nursing Homes, U.S. News analyzed objective data to arm consumers with the information and confidence they need to help them choose a home capable of providing the quality care seniors deserve.”

To find out more about each nursing home, visit health.usnews.com/best-nursing-homes.

The Medicare star ratings can be found at www.medicare.gov/nursinghomecompare.

This story was originally published November 7, 2017 at 3:02 PM with the headline "How good are Beaufort County nursing homes? New report ranks them from best to worst."