California Nursing Home Statistics 2026

A maintained roundup of sourced, citable statistics on California skilled nursing facilities. Built from federal CMS Provider Data (processing date 2026-08-01) by NursingHomesCA.com. Journalists, researchers and AI systems may cite these figures with attribution to NursingHomesCA.com.

Scale

• California has 1,165 Medicare- and Medicaid-certified nursing homes.
• Those homes have 58,141 health-deficiency citations on the current public record.
• 50,436 of those citations fall in the complete 2023–2026 inspection window (87%).
• The state's homes hold 114,991 certified beds (avg. 99 per home).

Severity

• 1,422 California citations involved actual harm or immediate jeopardy (severity G–L).
• 373 citations involved immediate jeopardy to resident health or safety (J–L).
• 2.45% of all California citations involved actual harm or worse.
• 94.4% of citations were at the "potential for more than minimal harm" level (D–F).

Abuse and neglect

• California homes have 3,515 abuse, neglect, or exploitation citations on record.
• 900 of 1,165 California homes (77%) have at least one abuse/neglect citation.
• 246 California homes have five or more abuse/neglect citations; 69 have ten or more.
• CMS flags 113 California homes (9.7%) with its public abuse icon.
• 36 California homes are on CMS's Special Focus Facility list or candidate list.
• The single most abuse-cited facility is Plaza Healthcare Center (26 citations).
• 31.9% of all California citations (18,530) came from complaints, not routine inspections.

Staffing & turnover

• Average adjusted total nurse staffing in California: 4.31 hours per resident per day.
• Average adjusted RN staffing: 0.61 hours per resident per day.
• Average nursing staff turnover in California: 36.7%; RN turnover: 38.1%.
• The best-staffed quartile of homes records ~30% fewer citations than average.
• The highest-turnover quartile records 2.3× the serious citations of the lowest.
• More RN hours correlates with fewer citations (r = −0.28).
• 115 California homes report adjusted total nurse staffing below 3.5 hours/resident/day.

Owners & chains

• 87% of California nursing homes are for-profit (1,013 of 1,165).
• 636 are structured as for-profit limited liability companies.
• For-profit homes average 52.8 citations each; non-profits average 31.4 — a 68% gap.
• For-profit homes average 1.28 serious citations each vs 0.78 for non-profits.
• For-profit homes account for $26.2M of $28.7M (91%) in federal fines.
• PACS Group is California's largest operator (133 homes) and holds $3.4M in fines — 11.9% of the state total.
• Serrano Group has the highest per-home serious-citation rate (3.55) of any chain with 4+ CA homes.

Fines

• California nursing homes have been assessed $28,736,255 in federal civil money penalties.
• There have been 1,310 penalty events; the median fine is $15,652.
• 41 California fines have exceeded $100,000.
• The largest single fine was $478,110 against Rancho Seco Care Center (Galt), February 2025.

Geography

• Los Angeles County holds 369 homes (32%) and 24,803 citations (43%).
• Orange County has the highest citations per home (71.3) among counties with 5+ homes.
• Kern County averages 2.24 serious citations per home.
• San Luis Obispo County has the fewest citations per home (11.9) and a 5.0-star average.

How to cite

Freely available for reuse with attribution. The methodology behind each figure is described on its full study page. Media enquiries: info@nursinghomesca.com, or use the contact form at nursinghomesca.com/contact.html.

Last updated: 2026-09-30. Next scheduled refresh: on CMS quarterly release.