Abby Gardens Healthcare Center

In addition to performing well in its overall grade, this nursing home performed at an even higher level in the area of inspections. In fact, it received a nearly flawless inspection report this year. As a result, it received one of our highest grades in that category with a score of A. These inspection ratings take several factors into consideration, including deficiencies, substantiated complaints and federal fines. You can learn more about each of these items by obtaining copies of nursing homes' inspection reports. This particular nursing home had just a single deficiency on its inspection report and it was not one deemed to pose a threat to patient health or safety. Even some of the best nursing homes receive an occasional ding on their inspection report.

Among its many impressive scores, this nursing home received an excellent nursing rating. In fact, we gave it a grade of B+ in that area. In computing a facility's nursing rating, we assess the quantity of hours nurses commit to residents and the level of licensure of the nurses. This particular nursing home provided 0.4 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, our nursing grades also factor in quality-based assessments, such as avoiding major falls. This nursing home performed well in this area. Avoiding major falls is typically a good indicator that a nursing home has reliable quality controls in place. Major falls can typically be avoided if more nurses aids and better safety protocols are in place.

In addition, this nursing home also received favorable long-term care grades this year. In fact, we gave them one of our stronger grades in that area, with a grade of B. For prospective patients looking for a permanent place to live as opposed to rehabilitation, long-term care is a very important category. On top of considering the quantity of care provided by nurses aids and other staff, we looked at the percentage of residents vaccinated for pneumonia. Unfortunately, we weren't able to locate information on vaccination rates. Clearly, this facility is doing something right in this area as it also excelled at keeping its residents out of the hospital. It had less than one hospitalization per one thousand long-term resident days, which is an impressively low number.

Moving on to the final area, this nursing home was awarded an extremely favorable short-term care grade. This facility didn't end up having any weaknesses. In the category of short-term care, we seek to assess indicators of a facility's rehabilitation. We assess the nursing home's skilled nursing services, such as the ones performed by registered nurses and physical, occupational and other therapists. Fortunately, it looks like this facility employs registered nurses. Not all nursing homes employs these types of nurses. On the other hand, according to the data they provided, it does not look like the facility employs physical therapists. Lastly, we considered the percentage of patients that ultimately were able to return home from this facility. We found that 0 percent of this facility's patients returned home.