Carlsbad by the Sea

On top of being a first rate nursing home overall, this nursing home also excelled in the area of nursing, where it received an A+. Few nursing homes performed better in this area. The nursing rating considers a variety of factors. The most important variable is the quantity of hours nurses spend with residents. This particular nursing home provided 0.5 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also looked at several nursing quality measures and this facility 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 state in this category. This is generally a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can generally be avoided by offering better nursing care, such as by having a policy of moving a resident even once per day.

This facility also was awarded an A+ short-term care grade, rendering it one of the few facilities to be awarded several A+ category scores. In computing these short-term care ratings, we assess the nursing home's skilled nursing services, such as those performed by registered nurses, respiratory therapists, physical therapists and other types of therapists. The purpose is to formulate a scale for sizing up the rehabilitation services of different nursing homes. Fortunately, it appear that this facility has registered nurses on staff. Not all facilities employs these types of nurses. However, based on the information this nursing home provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. The last item we assessed in this category is the percentage of patients who ultimately were able to return home from the facility. We found that 6.4 percent of this nursing home's residents returned home as opposed to remaining at the facility on a permanent basis.

This facility also received a nearly flawless inspection report. As a result, it received one of our highest grades in that category with a score of A+. Our inspection ratings account for several factors included in a nursing home's inspection report. One key criteria we rely on is the number and severity of deficiencies. Nursing homes with better scores in this area tend to have very few severe deficiencies. It doesn't appear that we were able to find information on deficiency's for this nursing home. Without the deficiency related data for this facility, it was a challenge to fully evaluate it in the inspections category.

Switching gears to our fourth category, this facility was given a very strong long-term care grade. We awarded it a B+ in this area, rounding out one of our better profiles. Long-term care grades in this range generally require both 24/7 care from nurses and aids, as well as quality routine healthcare services. In addition to looking at the volume of care provided by aids and other staff, we analyzed the number of residents vaccinated against pneumonia. This nursing home gave the vaccine to 100 percent of its residents, which is very impressive. Pneumonia sadly is often a dangerous illness for nursing home residents so we like it when a nursing home doesn't leave this to chance. Finally, this place was able to limit hospitalizations. Indeed, it had only 0 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low figure.