Atherton Park Post-Acute

While this facility's overall grade was not a highlight, it actually received a very good grade in the area of long-term care. In fact, we awarded it a B for that area, which is one of our better scores. Nursing homes that receive this type of score in this category typically provide consistent around the clock care to ensure patients are kept in good health. After we finished assessing the amount of nursing care, we then looked at the nursing home's vaccination record. This nursing home vaccinated 98.742134 percent of its residents against pneumonia, which is what we like to see. Pneumonia can be a life threatening illness for nursing home residents so we prefer when a facility does not leave its residents vulnerable. Clearly, this place is doing something right in this area as it also excelled at keeping its residents out of the hospital. In fact, it had less than one hospitalization per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low number.

One of the other reasons we rated this facility so highly is that it earned a very impressive nursing score. In that area, we gave this facility an C. In calculating a facility's nursing score, we look at the number of hours nurses spend with residents and the levels of training of the nurses. This facility provided just 0.4 hours of nursing care per resident per day. This is a relatively low total compared to most other facilities. Lastly, our nursing grades also factor in quality-based metrics, such as avoiding major falls. Despite not having the most impressive total nursing hours, this nursing home performed admirably in the area of preventing major falls. This is usually a reliable indicator that a nursing home has quality controls in place. Many falls can be avoided if a facility provides enough nurses aids to assist its residents.

This facility received its next highest category score in the area of short-term care. We gave this facility a C in this area, which is a respectable grade. In our short-term care score, we endeavor to craft a meaningful gauge for rehabilitation. In this process, we look at a facility's offerings of highly-skilled nursing services, including both registered nurses and physical therapy, as well as respiratory therapy. In this place's case, we were surprised to learn that it actually provides less registered nurse and physical therapist hours per patient than the typical facility. Finally, we assessed the percentage of residents who were able to return to the community from this facility. We found that 4.4 percent of this facility's residents returned home. At most facilities, closer to half of their patients are able to return home so this figure is below average.

Turning our last category of inspections, this facility received a horrible grade. For nursing homes with bad inspection scores, you should really focus on any severe deficiencies found on their inspection reports. This nursing home had 3 deficiencies by CMS. The only favorable thing we can say is that none of its deficiencies were in the categories that indicate they created a risk to patient health or safety. Finally, this facility also received 4 substantiated complaints in recent years. This is yet another bad sign.