Aperion Care Burbank

The main reason this facility received a decent overall score is its excellent health inspections in recent years. We awarded them one of our higher scores in that area, with an A. This is a much better score than the place's overall grade, which was decent but certainly not elite. We take several aspects of a facility's inspection report into consideration in computing these inspection scores. One key factor is deficiencies. You should keep in mind that the severity of deficiencies is usually more meaningful than the quantity of deficiencies, as some are relatively minor. This place was assessed 7 deficiencies on its inspection report, but none were considered to be severe. This indicates that the inspectors didn't deem any of the deficiencies to cause an imminent risk to resident safety or health. Keep in mind that deficiency-free inspections are uncommon in the industry.

One of the other reasons we rated this nursing home so highly is that it received a very impressive nursing score. Nursing proved to be its second best category grade. In that category, we awarded this nursing home an B-. The nursing grade is based on a number of factors. The most heavily weighted variable is the number of hours nurses spent with patients. This facility provided just 0.3 hours of nursing care per patient per day. This is a relatively low total compared to most nursing homes. Despite having low quantities of nursing care, this place surprisingly fared better in some of the quality measures we assessed. In fact, it scored well in the area of avoiding pressure ulcers and major falls.

The third category we assessed was long-term care. In that category, we gave this nursing home a solid grade of B-. For long-term care residents, the facility's primary goal is to keep patients healthy and safe. This is different than skilled nursing or short-term care where the goal is to rehabilitate patients. Once we looked at the volume of care provided by nurses aids and other staff, we next considered the facility's vaccination data. We were optimistic to discover that this nursing home vaccinated 100 percent of its patients against pneumonia. Finally, this place was also able to limit hospitalizations. Indeed, it had only 0.04 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low figure.

The last area we assessed is short-term care. We awarded this facility a C in this area. In our short-term care category, we attempt to create a meaningful barometer for rehabilitation. In doing so, we assess a facility's level of highly-skilled nursing services, including both registered nurses and physical therapy, as well as occupational therapy. Fortunately, it looks like this nursing home has registered nurses on staff. Not all nursing homes employs these types of nurses. On the other hand, based on the data this nursing home provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. Finally, we considered the percentage of patients who were able to return to the community from this nursing home. We found that 3.7 percent of this facility's patients returned home. At most nursing homes, closer to half of their patients are able to return home so this figure is below average.