Ballou Home for the Aged

We also wanted to emphasize that this nursing home earned near flawless health inspections in recent years. We awarded them an A+ in this category. We weigh several aspects of a nursing home's inspection report in computing our inspection ratings. One critical factor is deficiencies. You should keep in mind that the severity of these deficiencies is usually more meaningful than the quantity of deficiencies, as some deficiencies are relatively minor. Although this facility had some deficiencies on its report, none of them were major deficiencies based on CMS' deficiency scale. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

We also awarded this nursing home a grade of A+ for its nursing grade. Our nursing score is largely based on a facility's level of nurse staffing. This facility provided 0.7 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also assessed several nursing quality-based metrics and this nursing home excelled in some of these areas. With less than five percent of its residents sustaining pressure ulcers, it performed as well as any place the country in this category. This is generally a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can typically be avoided by offering better nursing care, such as by having a policy of turning a patient more often.

The third area we analyzed is long-term care. Adding to its strong resume, this facility also excelled in this category. In fact, we gave it a of A for the area. When nursing homes receive a grade in this range in long-term care it generally means it has plenty of staff and is an overall good place to reside on a permanent basis. One of the statistics we considered in addition to nursing hours was vaccines. This facility administered the pneumonia vaccine to 100 percent of its patients. Vaccination is a great way to avoid negative health outcomes for the senior population. Finally, this facility was able to limit hospitalizations. It had only 0.01 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low number.

In our final area, this nursing home also received a very strong short-term care rating, with an A. This finished off an elusive straight A report card. In forming our short-term care ratings, we assess the nursing home's skilled nursing services, such as those performed by registered nurses, speech therapists, physical therapists and other types of therapists. Our objective is to formulate a scale for comparing the rehabilitation services of various facilities. Fortunately, it appear that this nursing home has registered nurses on staff. Not every facility employs these skilled professionals. However, according to the data this nursing home provided, it does not look like the facility employs physical therapists. Lastly, we assessed the percentage of patients who were able to return to the community from this nursing home. We found that 0 percent of this facility's patients returned home.