Casa Arena Blanca Nursing Center

Casa Arena Blanca Nursing Center is an average-sized nursing home located in Alamogordo, New Mexico. With an overall rating of B, this facility is a fine option. Based on our analysis, you could do much worse than this nursing home. Keep reading to find this facility's category grades, which are also impressive. It is hard to find any major flaws in this place's profile.

Part of the reason this facility performed so well overall is that it fared well in long-term care, with a B+ in that area. It outpaced most facilities in this area. Facilities that receive this kind of score in this category typically provide consistent around the clock care to ensure residents are kept in good health. Once we looked at the quantity of care provided by aids and other staff, we next considered the nursing home's vaccination records. This facility vaccinated 92.85714 percent of its patients for pneumonia, which is slightly lower than we were hoping for but still a reasonably acceptable percentage. Lastly, this place was able to limit hospitalizations. With only 1.35 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, this facility has fewer hospitalizations than many nursing homes.

This nursing home received a strong short-term care score as well. We awarded it one of our better grades in that area with a score of B+. In calculating these short-term care scores, we quantify the facility's skilled nursing services, including those performed by registered nurses, respiratory therapists, physical therapists and other types of therapists. Our objective is to formulate a scale for sizing up the rehabilitation services of different facilities. One reason for this facility's strong score in this category is that it provides more care with registered nurses to its residents than the average nursing home. Lastly, we considered the percentage of residents who returned to the community from this nursing home. It outperformed the majority of facilities in the nation with 53.9 percent of its patients returning home.

In addition, this facility also received favorable nursing grades this year. In fact, we awarded them one of our better scores in that area, with a grade of B. We scrutinized the skill-level of nurses working for the facility, as well as the quantity of time those nurses worked with patients, in determining our rating in this area. This nursing home averages 3.2 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, our nursing grades also factor in quality-based assessments, such as avoiding major falls. This place performed well in this area. Avoiding major falls is typically a good indicator that a facility has reliable quality controls in place. Major falls can frequently be avoided if more nurses aids and better safety protocols are in place.

In the last area we looked at, we found that this facility received a solid government inspection report this year as well, with few major dings from government inspectors. As a result, it received a decent grade in inspections with a B. This facility didn't have any major weak links. Our inspection scores account for a host of factors included in a facility's inspection reports. One key criteria we weigh heavily is the quantity and severity of deficiencies. Nursing homes with better scores in this category usually have very few severe deficiencies. Fortunately, although this nursing home had some minor dings on its inspection report, it had zero severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are ones labeled as categories G through L. This tells you the inspectors didn't consider any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient health or safety. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.