Alden Estates of Shorewood

In addition to receiving a great overall grade, this nursing home received an A+ inspection score. This grade is based on the facility's recent inspection reports. An A+ in this category is one of the best complements we can offer a facility. Inspection scores weigh a host of factors included in a facility's inspection reports. One key criteria we look at is the number and severity of deficiencies. Places with higher scores in this area usually have very few severe deficiencies. Although this nursing home had some deficiencies on its report, none of them were major deficiencies based on CMS' deficiency scale. The fact that none of the deficiencies were severe leaves us less concerned with this inspection report.

One of the other reasons we rated this facility so well is that it was given a strong short-term care grade. Indeed, short-term care turned out to be its second most favorable category score. In that area, we awarded this nursing home a score of A. In calculating our short-term care grades, we analyze the facility's levels of skilled nursing, which includes registered nurses, physical therapists speech therapists and other licensed professionals. This area is often a reliable assessment of the facility's rehabilitation services. Fortunately, it appear that this facility has registered nurses on staff. Not every facility employs these types of nurses. However, based on the information they provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. The last measure we considered in this area is the percentage of residents who were able to leave the facility and return home. We discovered that 5.6 percent of this facility's residents returned home.

This facility is also strong in the area of nursing, where it received a grade of B. It outperformed most nursing homes in this category. Our nursing grade assesses the nursing home's nurse staffing levels. We weigh both the levels of training of the nurses and the quantity of hours spent with patients. This facility 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 facility performed well in this area. Avoiding major falls is typically a good indicator that a place has reliable quality controls in place. Major falls can typically be avoided if more nurses aids and better safety protocols are in place.

The final category we graded was long-term care, in which this nursing home received a B-. This actually ended up being this nursing home's weakest category. This is still nothing to be ashamed of. In a long-term care setting, the nursing home's primary goal is to maintain residents' quality of life and keep them safe. Once we looked at the volume of care provided by nurses and other staff, we then looked at the nursing home's vaccination statistics. This nursing home vaccinated 91.37931 percent of its residents against pneumonia, which happens to be somewhat below what we anticipated but still a reasonably acceptable figure. On a more positive note, this place was able to limit hospitalizations. It had only 0.04 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low figure.