Blaire House of Tewksbury

One of the reasons this turned out to be a strong nursing home is that it earned a very impressive inspection score. In fact, inspections turned out to be its best category. In this area, we gave it an A-. We weigh several aspects of a nursing home's inspection report in calculating our inspection scores. One critical factor is health deficiencies. It should be noted that the severity of these deficiencies is arguably more important than the quantity of deficiencies, as some can be relatively minor. Fortunately, although this nursing home had some minor dings on its inspection report, it had zero severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are found in categories G through L. This tells you CMS didn't consider any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient safety or health. We should note that deficiency-free inspection reports are uncommon in the industry.

Among this facility's other strengths is its elite nursing grade. We awarded them one of our better scores in that area, with a grade of A-. Our nursing score is mostly associated with the nursing home's level of nurse staffing. This facility provided 0.3 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 prevented if more nurses aids and better safety protocols are in place.

This facility received a strong short-term care grade as well. We awarded it one of our higher scores in that category with a grade of B. In determining our short-term care ratings, we look at the nursing home's skilled nursing services, such as those performed by registered nurses, respiratory therapists, physical therapists and other types of skilled professionals. The objective is to formulate a measure for sizing up the rehabilitation services of different nursing homes. Unfortunately, it does not appear that this nursing home provided data regarding its registered nurse or physical therapy staffing. The final statistic we considered in this category is the number of patients that ultimately were able to return home from the nursing home. We found that 5.2 percent of this nursing home's patients returned home as opposed to remaining at the nursing home on a permanent basis.

Turning to our next category, this facility was given a respectable long-term care grade. Even though this was not quite as dominant as some of its other scores, this is truly a middle of the pack score. Long-term care grades are used to score a nursing home's performance as a traditional nursing home, as opposed to focusing more on the skilled nursing services offered by a skilled nursing facility. Once we assessed the quantity of care provided by nurses aids and other staff, we then looked at the facility's vaccination records. This facility vaccinated 96.16368 percent of its residents against pneumonia, which is higher than most nursing homes. Lastly, this place was also able to limit hospitalizations. In fact, it had only 0.01 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low figure.