Bledsoe County Nursing Home

This nursing home received a strong overall grade as described above, but we especially wanted to emphasize its excellent nursing rating. We gave them a grade of A- in this area. In computing our nursing ratings, we assess both nursing hours and the skill levels of the nurses. This particular nursing home provided 0 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also assessed some nursing quality-based metrics in determining our nursing grades. This nursing home performed very well when it comes to minimizing its residents' pressure ulcers and major falls. We consider these areas to be good indicators of the quality of nursing care.

This facility is also strong in the category of short-term care, where it received a grade of B+. It outpaced most nursing homes in this area. Our short-term care ratings are likely more meaningful for individuals needing rehabilitation services. Rehabilitation typically utilizes more skilled nursing. Skilled nursing means not merely nursing services, but also physical and speech therapy, as well as other forms of therapy. We weren't able to locate information on registered nurse or physical therapy staffing for this nursing home. The last item we considered in this category is the number of residents who ultimately returned home from the nursing home. We found that 0 percent of this nursing home's patients returned home as opposed to remaining at the nursing home on a permanent basis.

Another strong feature for this facility is that it excelled in inspections, with a grade of B in that category. It outperformed most nursing homes in this category. Inspection grades are tied to many items located in the a nursing home's recent inspection reports. Places that score well in this category tend to have very few deficiencies on those reports. Most importantly, these places should not have any severe deficiencies which are associated with risks to patient safety. Although this facility had some deficiencies on its inspection report, none of them were serious based on CMS' scale. A couple minor dings aren't the end of the world.

The last category we scored was long-term care, in which this facility was awarded a grade of B. This facility ended up being relatively strong in all areas we analyzed. Nursing homes that do well in long-term care typically provide patients with closer supervision and stay on top of routine medical care. On top of looking at the quantity of care provided by nurses and other staff, we also looked at the number of residents vaccinated against pneumonia. This facility vaccinated 99.375 percent of its patients, which is what we like to see. Pneumonia is too frequently a life threatening illness for nursing home residents so we prefer when a nursing home doesn't roll the dice on this issue. Clearly, this nursing home is doing something right in this area as it also excelled at keeping its patients 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.