New Orleans-Area Nursing Homes by the Numbers: What CMS's October 2026 Data Shows

What the data covers

LDH's October 2026 roster lists 37 licensed nursing homes in Orleans, Jefferson, St. Tammany, St. Bernard, Plaquemines and St. Charles parishes. 35 of them match a record in CMS's Provider Information dataset, which means they are certified for Medicare, Medicaid or both. CMS publishes their star ratings, the results of health inspections that LDH's Health Standards Section carries out on its behalf, staffing hours reported through payroll data, turnover and fines.

Homes on LDH's roster without a CMS record are not certified, so they cannot bill Medicare or Medicaid for the care. That matters to any family who expects Medicaid to pay later.

How the stars are spread

The overall rating blends three parts: health inspections, which carry the most weight, staffing, and quality measures. Because CMS sets the inspection component relative to other homes in the same state, a three-star home in Louisiana is average among Louisiana homes, not necessarily average nationally.

Parish by parish

Orleans Parish has the most homes, including several long-established nonprofit and faith-based homes, and Jefferson and St. Tammany follow. Plaquemines and St. Charles have very few, so families there often compare homes across the parish line.

Staffing: the number to look at second

Across the certified homes in the six parishes, the median total nurse staffing reported to CMS is 3.83 hours per resident per day. Each facility page on this site shows a home's figure next to that median, along with registered-nurse hours and turnover. High turnover is often a better warning sign than a single bad inspection, because it means residents keep meeting new caregivers.

Ask on a tour how many aides work each shift and how many are agency staff. The CMS number is an average; the night shift is what your parent will live with.

Reading an inspection without overreacting

A deficiency count by itself says little. Read what was cited, how serious it was, and whether it was repeated. Ask the home for its statement of deficiencies and plan of correction, and ask what changed. A home that answers specifically is usually one that takes inspections seriously.

Also ask about storms. Federal rules require each certified home to plan for evacuation and sheltering in place and to keep residents at safe temperatures if power fails. Ask where residents went the last time the home evacuated.

Turnover, fines and the abuse icon

Three more CMS fields deserve a look on every facility page. Nursing staff turnover shows how often caregivers leave; a home above the local median is worth asking about. Fines and payment denials in CMS's three-year penalty window show where federal enforcement has been used. And CMS's abuse icon flags homes cited for abuse in the past year, or for potential abuse in each of the past two years. None of these alone should rule a home out, but each should produce a specific question on the tour.

Long-stay and short-stay are different questions

Many New Orleans nursing homes run short-stay rehab and long-term care side by side. CMS publishes separate quality measures for each. A family choosing a rehab stay after a hospitalization should look at short-stay measures, such as whether patients return to the community; a family choosing a long-term home should look at long-stay measures, such as falls with major injury and pressure ulcers. Ask the home which unit your parent would be on.

Using the ratings with an advisor

The data narrows the field; a visit and a conversation finish the job. An advisor can tell you which homes have long-term beds open now and which accept Louisiana Medicaid for new long-stay residents, two facts CMS does not publish.

What CMS data cannot show

CMS data cannot show whether a home has a long-term bed open this month, whether its dining room feels welcoming, or whether the charge nurse on nights knows your parent by name. It also lags: an inspection can be a year old by the time families read it. Use the numbers to pick which homes to visit, then let the visit decide.