Spokane Health & Rehabilitation: Food Quality Failures - WA
The resident, identified in inspection records only as Resident 85, is diabetic and requires a mechanically altered therapeutic diet. She is cognitively intact and told inspectors exactly what she thought. The hot food was lukewarm. The cold food was often hot. The menu lacked variety. On April 17, she said she had ordered out that day.
Federal inspectors didn't take her word for it alone. They came back five days later with a test tray.
On April 22, at 12:31 in the afternoon, the survey team sampled the lunch service: roasted chicken, mashed potatoes, corn, ravioli with marinara, and peach cobbler. What they found was not roasted chicken in any meaningful sense. The meat was colorless, dry, and tasted like plain boiled chicken breast. The mashed potatoes were bland, inspectors wrote, similar to plain unseasoned instant boxed mashed potatoes, served without butter or gravy. The ravioli had dried edges that made it difficult to cut. The peach cobbler looked watery and soupy, though inspectors noted it had good peach cobbler flavor. The marinara, too, had good flavor.
Two items out of five.
That afternoon, inspectors sat down with Staff GG, the dietary manager. The explanation was straightforward: the facility had recently changed ownership, and with it, food suppliers. The new spring and summer menu from the new supplier had launched just three days earlier. Staff GG said the kitchen typically prepared new recipes exactly as directed the first time, then worked with a dietician to make adjustments afterward. Staff GG acknowledged that the lunch was bland, looked colorless, and was not very appetizing.
Two days later, in a follow-up interview on the morning of April 24, Staff GG offered more detail. The food had been tasted after preparation. There had been complaints of blandness. The kitchen had tried to alter the recipes to make them more palatable, but couldn't add much salt because of residents' dietary restrictions. As for the temperature complaints, Staff GG said the food was cooked to proper temperatures and placed on hot plates, but getting trays to residents was nursing's responsibility. There had been occasional complaints about food arriving cold, and those meals had been replaced.
The facility sits at North 6025 Assembly in Spokane, a city where winters are long and institutional food has a way of becoming the texture of daily life for people who can no longer leave on their own. For a resident like Resident 85, cognitively sharp, aware of exactly what she's eating and why it falls short, the meals aren't a minor inconvenience. They are most of what the day offers.
She ordered takeout. That option isn't available to everyone.
The inspection, completed April 24, cited the facility under Washington state regulations governing food quality and palatability. The level of harm was listed as minimal harm or potential for actual harm, affecting some residents.
The dietary manager knew the food was bland. The residents had said so. Inspectors confirmed it with a fork. What remained, as of the inspection's close, was a kitchen still working through a new supplier's recipes, a dietician consultation somewhere in the future, and a diabetic resident on a therapeutic diet who had already found her own solution.
Full Inspection Report
The details above represent a summary of key findings. View the complete inspection report for Spokane Health & Rehabilitation from 2025-04-24 including all violations, facility responses, and corrective action plans.
Additional Resources
Data source: This article is based on inspection data downloaded directly from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) via Medicare.gov. CMS releases inspection reports in bulk; we publish the findings as documented by state surveyors in the official Form CMS-2567 Statement of Deficiencies.
Plan of correction: The CMS report we receive does not include the facility's plan of correction. Facilities submit plans of correction separately to state survey agencies and those responses may not be reflected in CMS data at the time of publication. The absence of a plan of correction in our data does not mean one was not filed. Readers who want information about corrective steps taken are encouraged to contact the facility directly or their state survey agency.
Corrections may have occurred: Inspection reports reflect conditions observed on the date of the survey. Facilities may have implemented corrections, staffing changes, additional training, or other remediation since the report was issued. We report what CMS provides and encourage readers to seek current information from the facility.
Editorial process: Inspection findings are extracted from CMS source documents and synthesized using AI, reviewed for factual accuracy against the original report by our editorial team.
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Professional review: All content reviewed by Christopher F. Nesbitt, Sr., NH EMT & BU-trained Paralegal.
Last verified: October 26, 2026 · Our methodology
SPOKANE HEALTH & REHABILITATION in SPOKANE, WA was cited for violations during a health inspection on April 24, 2025.
The resident, identified in inspection records only as Resident 85, is diabetic and requires a mechanically altered therapeutic diet.
Health inspections identify deficiencies that facilities must correct. Violations range from minor documentation issues to serious safety concerns. Review the full report below for specific details and facility response.