Briar Hill Health Care Residen

This facility earned a solid overall grade as described above, but we really wanted to emphasize its nearly flawless health inspections in recent years. We awarded them an impressive grade of A in this category. These inspection grades weigh several factors, including deficiencies and federal fines. You can learn more about each of these items by obtaining copies of nursing homes' inspection reports. This particular nursing home had just a single deficiency on its inspection report and it was not one deemed to pose a threat to patient health or safety. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

This nursing home also was awarded a strong long-term care score. As a matter of fact, we awarded them a grade of B in this category, which is one of our better. Long-term care scores of this caliber generally require both 24/7 care from nurses and aids, as well as quality routine medical care. After considering the volume of care provided by aids and other staff, we turned to the nursing home's vaccination data. This nursing home vaccinated 97.30769 percent of its patients against pneumonia, which is much higher than the average nursing home. Clearly, this place is doing something right in this area as it also excelled at keeping its patients out of the hospital. It had less than one hospitalization per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is an impressively low figure.

This facility received its third most favorable category grade in the category of short-term care. We gave this nursing home a grade of C in this category, which is an acceptable score. In the category of short-term care, we attempt to qualify indicators of a nursing home's rehabilitation services. We assess a nursing home's skilled nursing services, such as the ones performed by registered nurses and physical, occupational and other therapists. Fortunately, it looks like this facility employs registered nurses. Not all nursing homes employs these types of nurses. On the other hand, according to the information this nursing home provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. Lastly, we considered the number of patients who were able to return to the community from this facility. We found that 4.8 percent of this facility's residents returned home. At most nursing homes, closer to half of their patients are able to return home so this figure is below average.

The last area we assessed was nursing. This nursing home was awarded a grade of C for this area. Our nursing rating is based on the facility's nurse staffing levels. We weigh both the levels of licensure of those nurses as well as the amount of time spent with patients. This nursing home provides only 0.4 hours of nursing care per patient each day. This is a somewhat alarming figure as it is well below average. Finally, we also assessed some nursing quality measures. Although this place got dinged a bit for its nursing hours per resident, it actually excelled in some of these quality-based measures. With less than five percent of its patients experiencing pressure ulcers, it fared well in this area. This is generally an indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can many times be avoided by providing better nursing care, such as by employing a protocol of turning a patient at least once a day.