Carmel Hills Care Center

On top of receiving a great overall score, this facility also earned an excellent long-term care grade, with an A. Long-term care ratings in this range generally require both 24/7 care from nurses and aids, as well as quality routine medical care. One of the datapoints we considered after nursing hours is vaccinations. This facility provided the pneumonia vaccination to 100 percent of its residents. This is a great way to avoid unnecessary hospitalizations for the aged 65 and up population. Clearly, this place is doing something right in this area as it was able to keep its residents 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.

On the list of its many dominant grades, this nursing home was awarded first-rate short-term care grade. In fact, we gave it a score of A in this category. Short-term care ratings are based in part on the facility's quantity of skilled nursing services. This includes a vast spectrum of nursing services, ranging from registered nurses to physical and respiratory therapists, in addition to other variations of therapy. Fortunately, it appear that this nursing home employs registered nurses. Not all facilities employs these skilled professionals. However, according to the data this nursing home provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. Finally, we assessed the percentage of patients who were able to return to the community from this nursing home. We found that 5.8 percent of this facility's residents returned home.

This nursing home also received a very impressive nursing grade. In that area, we awarded this facility a grade of A-. In computing a facility's nursing score, we weigh the quantity of hours nurses commit to patients as well as the level of skill of those nurses. This nursing home averages 0.5 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also assessed several nursing quality-based metrics 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 facility the nation in this category. This is generally a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can often be prevented by offering better nursing care, such as employing a protocol of moving patients even once per day.

Wrapping up its impressive profile, this nursing home also performed a high level in the area of inspections. In fact, it earned a nearly flawless government inspection report this year. As a result, it received one of our highest grades in that category with a score of B+. Inspection grades take several factors into consideration, including deficiencies and substantiated complaints. You can find more information about each of these issues by obtaining copies of nursing homes' inspection reports. While this place had some minor dings on its inspection report, it had zero severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are those labeled as categories G through L. This tells you the inspectors did not consider any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient safety or health. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.