Records desk / what the file leaves out
What the public file will never tell you about a private caregiver
This desk is built on a rule: no figure appears unless it can be reproduced from a named public file. The other half of that rule is less comfortable and just as binding. Where a question cannot be answered from a public file, the answer given is that it cannot be answered from a public file. For a family hiring a private caregiver, most of the questions that actually decide the arrangement fall in that second half. This page lists them, so you do not wait for a table this desk will never be able to publish.
What is on file, stated once so the gaps are visible
Six government files sit on this desk. Three are from CMS: the home health provider file, the HHCAHPS patient survey file, and the zip service-area file. Together they name Medicare-certified home health agencies, score most of them, and map reported service by zip. In the July 2026 release, pulled 2026-09-10, 50 such agencies have a metro street address, 47 carry a quality star, 38 of those 47 carry a survey star, and 81 distinct certification numbers report serving at least one of 262 metro zip codes.
Two are from the states. Missouri DHSS lists certified home health providers; 39 agencies name at least one St. Louis metro Missouri county in the extract updated 2026-09-04. Illinois IDPH publishes a home services agency directory of 1,029 rows. This desk does not republish the Illinois file at row level. One is from NPPES: 1,162 organisational registrations under taxonomy 253Z00000X in 65 metro cities, published as counts only.
Not one of those files contains a single named private caregiver, a rate, a training record, a shift-coverage policy, or a background-check result you can look up. That is the inventory of the gaps.
The file will never name the person who arrives
CMS scores agencies. DHSS licenses agencies. NPPES enumerates organisations. None of them identifies the individual who will be in the house. A quality star on the star ratings file is an agency-level average across Medicare patients in a closed reporting window. It is not a description of Tuesday's aide. An NPI under 253Z00000X is a billing identifier an organisation requested. It is not a person, and nothing removes it when the organisation stops sending anyone.
If you need to know who comes, what happens when that person is sick, and who you call at nine on a Sunday, you will not find it in 6jpm-sxkc, ccn4-8vby, or the NPI registry. Ask the provider, in writing. The hiring guide at Hire Caregiver STL is built around those questions because the public record is not.
The file will never tell you what it costs
No file on this desk contains a rate, an hourly price, a minimum-shift rule, a holiday surcharge, or a mileage charge, and this site publishes none, because no public source carries them for this metro. A star is not a price. A licence number is not a price. An NPI count by city is not a price. Anyone who treats a higher star as a more expensive agency, or a missing star as a cheaper one, has left the record. Get the rate in writing, including the minimum shift and the notice needed to change or cancel, and compare those figures against each other, not against a CMS column.
The file will never score a private caregiver
The quality star and the survey star exist because Medicare certifies home health agencies and runs a quality programme for them. Non-medical care at home is not that programme. Missouri does not license the category. CMS has never scored it. A private caregiver, or a company that sends one, has no star on this desk, and that is the expected and correct result, not a low score. Treating the star table as a comparison set for that hire is comparing a score to the absence of a score.
The largest number on this desk is the one that tells you the least. 1,162 organisational NPI registrations in 65 cities is a count of paperwork. Applying for an NPI involves no inspection, no proof of competence, no bond, no insurance check, and no state approval. This desk publishes the count because it is the only public measure of how crowded the unlicensed category is, and because leaving it out would imply the category is empty. It is not a leaderboard of caregivers.
The file will never tell you about the first week home
A hospital discharge starts a logistics problem: who is in the house overnight, who handles meals, who is there for the first follow-up, and whether a certified home health nurse is even coming. Medicare covers home health services only when its conditions are met, and it does not pay for long-term personal care on its own. The CMS files can tell you whether a named certified agency exists, how it was scored in a closed window, and whether it reports serving the zip. They cannot tell you whether anyone will be there tonight. That week is the subject of After the Hospital STL, not of a star table.
Service area is not capacity, and a missing star is not a verdict
The zip file's 3,563 agency-to-zip rows say which certified agencies report serving which zips. The most-covered zip has 34. Two zips are served by exactly one. Those are reported service areas. They are not open slots. St. Louis County reads 27 certified agencies per zip at the median on the county coverage file; Calhoun County reads 3. Density is not availability.
3 metro-addressed agencies have no quality star in this release. 9 of the 47 star-rated agencies have no survey star. CMS withholds a star when volume is too low to score. This desk shows those agencies as having none rather than as zero. A private caregiver is in a different situation still: there is no scoring system to be withheld from.
The public files on this desk prove identity, category, certification, reported service area, and, for most certified home health agencies, two federal stars from a closed reporting window.
They do not prove who arrives, how they are screened or supervised, what the work costs, whether a slot is open, or whether a private caregiver is any good with your particular relative. Those answers are not unpublished here. They are unpublished everywhere in the public record this desk is allowed to cite.
What to do with a gap instead of a number
Ask the provider for the legal name, then run the five lookups. Ask who comes, who covers, who employs, who insures, what it costs, and how the contract ends, and get the answers in writing. Ask for references from families in a similar situation and call them. A record can tell you whether a provider is what it claims to be. Only people can tell you what it is like to work with, and no public file in Missouri or Illinois is a substitute for that call.
New Plan Care
New Plan Care is a client of OwnersFirm and pays for this box. It provides non-medical care at home. No government file on this desk scores it, names its caregivers, or lists a rate, because no such file exists for this category in Missouri. The box is here because it was bought, not because a record produced it. Put it through the same identity checks as anyone else.
Call New Plan Care at (314) 405-0887.
Sources
- CMS 6jpm-sxkc, ccn4-8vby, m5eg-upu5. Pulled 2026-09-10.
- Missouri DHSS, 3dcz-79am. Portal record updated 2026-09-04.
- Illinois IDPH, 9miz-pbzm, 1,029 rows. Row-level republication held.
- NPPES, NPI Registry, taxonomy 253Z00000X.
- Medicare, Home health services coverage.
- U.S. Census Bureau, 2020 ZCTA to county relationship file.
This file lists questions the public record cannot answer. It is not medical advice and not a review of any caregiver.