How to check a nursing home's violations and inspection reports

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By Nursing Homes In Each State · Published October 31, 2026 · Last updated October 31, 2026

Every nursing home certified by Medicare or Medicaid is inspected by its state's survey agency on behalf of CMS, the federal agency that runs both programs. When inspectors find that a home isn't meeting a federal requirement, they cite it. These citations are officially called deficiencies; people searching for them usually say violations. Here is where to find them, how to read them, and what to do with what you learn.

Step 1: Look the home up on Care Compare

Medicare Care Compare is CMS's official public site. Search for nursing homes by name, city or ZIP code and open the home's profile. Its inspection section shows:

• the home's health inspection star rating and the date of its most recent standard inspection;
• how many health deficiencies inspectors found, next to the state and national averages;
• each deficiency from its recent inspections, with its date, the requirement it falls under, its scope and severity, and whether it has been corrected;
• fire safety and emergency preparedness inspections, which are separate from health inspections;
• penalties: fines and denials of Medicare or Medicaid payment.

Care Compare is the right place to start, but it shows short summaries. A 2023 review by the HHS Office of Inspector General also found that, as of December 2020, Care Compare had not accurately reported one or more deficiencies for an estimated two-thirds of nursing homes, so if a decision depends on a home's record, read the full report too.

Step 2: Read the full inspection report (Form CMS-2567)

After an inspection, the state survey agency writes up its findings on Form CMS-2567, the Statement of Deficiencies and Plan of Correction. It is the primary record, and it says far more than a summary. For each deficiency it gives:

• The tag: the federal requirement that wasn't met. Health requirements use F-tags (F689, for example, covers accidents and supervision); fire safety uses K-tags and emergency preparedness E-tags.
• The scope and severity letter, from A to L (see the table below).
• What the inspectors found: what they observed, what records showed and what staff and residents told them. Residents are identified by a number or letter, not by name.
• The home's plan of correction: what it says it will do to fix the problem and by when. CMS generally expects a home to submit an acceptable plan within 10 calendar days of receiving the report.

There are three ways to get a 2567:

1. Ask the nursing home. Federal rules require every certified home to post the results of its most recent inspection where residents and families can see them, and to make its inspection, certification and complaint investigation reports from the past three years available to anyone who asks.
2. Check your state survey agency. Some agencies post full reports on their websites; others send them on request.
3. Ask CMS. You can request a copy from CMS, including through a Freedom of Information Act request.

Step 3: Contact your state survey agency

The state survey agency, usually part of the state health department, does the inspecting. Standard inspections are unannounced and, under federal law, must happen no more than 15 months apart, with a statewide average of 12 months. Inspectors also come back to investigate complaints and to check that problems were fixed. Beyond the reports, the agency can:

• tell you about recent or open complaint investigations it is able to share;
• in many states, show you state licensing inspections, which can cite state rules that don't appear in CMS's federal data;
• take a complaint about a home's care. Anyone can file one, and you don't have to be a resident or a relative.

Your state's long-term care ombudsman program is a second, free resource. Ombudsmen advocate for residents, know the homes in their area and can help you read a report or raise a concern.

Step 4: Check the citations on our pages

Every nursing home page on this site lists the home's health inspection citations from the last three years, grouped by inspection date, from the same CMS data behind Care Compare. Each citation shows its A to L letter in plain words, CMS's category, the tag, whether it came from a complaint inspection or concerned infection control, and its correction status. The same page shows the home's fines and payment denials, its CMS star ratings, staffing, and whether CMS lists it as a Special Focus Facility or shows its abuse icon. Find a home from your state page below, or search near you.

To compare records, put up to four homes side by side. Each state also has a ranked list of the homes CMS rates lowest, which puts Special Focus Facilities first, for example in Texas, California, Ohio, Florida, Illinois and Pennsylvania.

How to read the A to L severity letters

Inspectors grade each deficiency on two things: how serious it is (severity) and how many residents it affected or could affect (scope: isolated, a pattern, or widespread). Together they give one letter.

Letters A to F mean inspectors found no actual harm to residents; G to L mean they did, or found residents in immediate jeopardy. Beyond any single letter, what matters is the pattern across inspections.

What to look for

• Any G to L citation. These mean inspectors found that residents were actually harmed, or were in immediate jeopardy. Read the full finding.
• The same tag cited again and again across inspections, which suggests a problem the home hasn't fixed.
• Citations from complaint inspections. They show that someone was concerned enough to report the home, and that inspectors agreed.
• Citations about abuse, neglect or resident rights, and whether CMS shows its abuse icon.
• Fines and payment denials. CMS imposes these for more serious or uncorrected problems.
• Special Focus Facility status. CMS puts a small number of homes with a persistent record of serious problems in this program and inspects them more often.
• How old the record is. An inspection can be more than a year old, and a new owner or administrator may have changed things for better or worse.

Keep the health inspection star in context too: CMS grades it on a curve within each state, so it compares a home only with other homes in the same state. Our guide to nursing home star ratings explains how it's built.

What to do with what you find

• Ask the administrator about specific citations: what happened, what changed, and whether the plan of correction worked. A good home will answer directly.
• Visit more than once, at different times of day, including a weekend or a mealtime.
• Talk to the ombudsman before you decide, and again if you have concerns once someone has moved in.
• Report a problem to your state survey agency. If someone is in danger, call 911 first.

More guides

• Nursing home star ratings, explained

  How CMS builds the overall star from inspections, staffing and quality measures, with the live national spread of ratings.

• What is a skilled nursing facility?

  What "skilled nursing facility" means, how it differs from a nursing home and rehab, who works there, and how CMS rates them.

• Does Medicare pay for nursing home care?

  What Medicare covers in a nursing home in 2026, the 3-day hospital rule, what you pay on days 21 to 100, and where Medicaid comes in.

Last updated October 31, 2026. Figures about nursing homes on this page come from the CMS Provider Data Catalog, October 2026, and update when CMS releases new data. Rules and dollar amounts are from the government sources listed above and can change; check them before you rely on them. Not medical, legal or financial advice. Nursing Homes In Each State is independent and not affiliated with CMS or Medicare. About the data · Report an error.