Records desk / how to read a survey star
Reading the patient-survey stars without over-reading them
The patient survey star is the friendlier-looking of the two CMS stars on this desk, and that is exactly why it gets over-read. It comes from interviews with patients after a home health episode. It feels like a review. It is not a review, it is not about the companion you may also be hiring, and a missing survey star is not a zero. This page is how to read the column without asking it to do work the file does not do.
Where the number comes from
CMS publishes the Home Health Care CAHPS survey results as Home Health Care Patient Survey (HHCAHPS) ccn4-8vby. This desk joined that file to Home Health Care Agencies 6jpm-sxkc on CMS Certification Number, for agencies with a street address inside the fifteen county St. Louis metro, using the Census Bureau 2020 ZCTA to county relationship file as the boundary. The CMS release is July 2026. The pull date is 2026-09-10. The survey period stated on the CMS record is 2025 Q1 to 2025 Q4.
The survey summary star is a whole star from 1 to 5, computed by CMS from surveys returned by an agency's patients. This desk copies the value. It does not compute, weight, round, or adjust it. The public tool with the same data plus the question-level detail is Medicare Care Compare.
What the metro file actually shows
38 of the 47 star-rated Medicare-certified home health agencies in this metro carry a survey star in the current release. 14 of those 38 hold the top mark of 5. In this release every metro survey value is a 2, a 3, a 4, or a 5. No metro agency holds a 1. The other 9 of the 47 have no survey star at all. They are named on the survey stars file in a second, unranked table, with their quality star beside them, and they are never rendered as zero.
CMS publishes no survey star for an agency with too few completed surveys in the period. The rule is the programme's, set out on the HHCAHPS site, not this desk's. A blank in that column is a sample-size fact. It is not a hidden failing grade, and it is not permission to skip the agency.
Proves how CMS summarised returned HHCAHPS surveys for that certified home health agency's patients in the 2025 Q1 to 2025 Q4 window, as a whole star from 1 to 5, where enough surveys came back to publish one.
Proves nothing about non-medical care at home, nothing about patients who never received a survey or never returned one, and nothing about the clinician who will be assigned to your relative. A 5 is not a promise. A missing star is not a 1.
Do not blend it with the quality star
The quality of patient care star, from the provider file, summarises clinical process and outcome measures drawn from assessment and claims data. The survey star summarises what patients said about the experience. This desk prints them beside each other on both the star ratings file and the survey file, and it never blends them. The two columns often disagree. That disagreement is information. An agency can score well on clinical measures and less well on how the episode felt, or the reverse. Averaging them produces a number CMS did not publish.
On the survey file, the quality star enters the sort only as a tie-break between agencies holding the same survey star. On the star ratings file, the sort runs the other way. If you need one ordered list, pick the question first, then open the file that sorts on that question. Do not build a third list of your own from the two columns.
The time lag, and the people who were asked
The surveys behind the current star were collected across 2025 Q1 to 2025 Q4. You are reading them in a July 2026 release, copied here on 2026-09-10. CMS refreshes both files quarterly, so the current Care Compare page may already differ from this copy. A recent change in an agency will not be in a survey that closed last year.
The people who were asked are Medicare home health patients, after an episode of skilled care. They were not asked about long-term personal care, companionship, or homemaking. Medicare does not pay for those services on their own. If the help you need is a person in the house through the evening, the survey star on a certified agency is a report from a different arrangement. For hiring that person, the matching guide is Hire Caregiver STL, not this column.
If you are reading the survey star because someone just came home from a hospital, remember what the survey is of: patients after a home health episode, not families in the first week. The first week is a staffing and logistics problem, walked through at After the Hospital STL.
How to use a survey star without over-reading it
Confirm you are looking at a certified home health agency, not a non-medical provider. Read the survey star next to the quality star without averaging them. If the survey star is missing, read the second table on the survey file and look at the quality star that is there, then check HHCAHPS for the too-few-surveys rule rather than inventing a reason. Confirm the agency reports serving the zip of the house. Then ask the questions no survey of other people's episodes can answer: who comes to this house, what happens when that person is out, who employs them, who insures the visit, and what the contract says about ending it.
A survey star is a federal summary of returned questionnaires from a closed year of Medicare home health episodes. Used that way, it is a useful document. Used as a character reference for a caregiver who has not been assigned yet, it is the wrong paper.
New Plan Care
HHCAHPS surveys the patients of Medicare-certified home health agencies. New Plan Care is not one of those agencies. CMS runs no patient survey for non-medical care at home, so there is no survey star to copy and none is missing. New Plan Care pays for this box. It is a client of OwnersFirm. The placement is labelled because it was bought, not because a survey put it here.
Call New Plan Care at (314) 405-0887.
Sources
- CMS Provider Data Catalog, Home Health Care Patient Survey (HHCAHPS) ccn4-8vby, July 2026 release, pulled 2026-09-10.
- CMS Provider Data Catalog, Home Health Care Agencies 6jpm-sxkc, pulled 2026-09-10.
- HHCAHPS programme site.
- Medicare Care Compare.
- Medicare, Home health services coverage.
- U.S. Census Bureau, 2020 ZCTA to county relationship file.
This file describes how to read a federal patient survey rating. It is not medical advice and not a recommendation of any agency.