Windmill Village Rehab: Smoking Safety Violation - TX
She didn't know smoking wasn't allowed on that patio. She had no cigarettes or lighter of her own in her room. Someone on staff had brought her out and lit her up, and then she was on her own.
The inspection, conducted November 25, 2025, stemmed from a complaint. What it found was a gap between what the administrator believed was happening in her facility and what was actually happening — a gap wide enough for a resident to fall through.
The resident told inspectors she had no idea the Hall 300 patio wasn't a designated smoking area. Her frame of reference made sense: when she had been housed on Hall 100, she could see people smoking outside her window. If residents were smoking out there, she reasonably assumed smoking out there was permitted. Nobody told her otherwise when a staff member brought her to the Hall 300 patio and lit her cigarette.
She also told inspectors she didn't know the code to get back into the facility. She was outside, alone, with a lit cigarette, in a place she believed was authorized and with no independent way to return indoors.
The administrator, interviewed on October 14, 2025, at 3:15 in the afternoon, said she was not aware staff had been taking residents to the Hall 300 patio to smoke at all. The facility's designated smoking area exists precisely so residents can be monitored and kept safe, she said. The charge nurse was supposed to be watching any staff who took residents out to smoke. All staff had been trained on the smoking policy and where the designated area was located.
Her expectation, she said, was that staff would follow the policy.
They were not following the policy. And until inspectors showed up, she didn't know.
The facility's smoking policy, last revised in March 2023, states that smoking is permitted only in designated areas outside the building and that fireproof containers must be available in those areas. The Hall 300 patio was not that area. The resident brought there didn't know that. The staff member who brought her didn't act like they knew that either, or didn't care.
When the administrator was asked about what could go wrong, she said the potential negative outcome was a fire.
That's the word she used. Fire. A resident with no way back inside a building, holding a lit cigarette in an area not equipped or designated for smoking, in a facility housing people who need rehabilitation and care.
The violation was cited at a level of minimal harm or potential for actual harm, affecting a few residents. In the hierarchy of nursing home citations, that's toward the lower end. No one was burned. No fire started. The resident made it back inside.
But the administrator's own answer captures what the inspection actually documented: a breakdown in supervision so complete that the person responsible for the facility had no idea her staff were routinely taking residents to an unauthorized patio to smoke, and a resident had been sitting out there alone, unable to get back in, not knowing she was somewhere she wasn't supposed to be.
She had watched people smoke outside her window on Hall 100. She thought that's just what you did here. Someone handed her a cigarette, walked her to a patio, and left.
Full Inspection Report
The details above represent a summary of key findings. View the complete inspection report for Windmill Village Rehabilitation & Care Center from 2025-11-25 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.
Professional review: All content reviewed by Christopher F. Nesbitt, Sr., NH EMT & BU-trained Paralegal.
Last verified: August 27, 2026 · Our methodology
WINDMILL VILLAGE REHABILITATION & CARE CENTER in LUBBOCK, TX was cited for violations during a health inspection on November 25, 2025.
She didn't know smoking wasn't allowed on that patio.
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.