Commander Nursing Center
4438 Pamplico Highway, Florence SC 29505 · (843) 669-3502 · 86.8% estimated occupancy 1Updated: Aug 1, 2020 · By Nick Reese
Commander Nursing Center is in Florence, South Carolina. This city has a population of 88,459 people. This nursing home received a bottom of the barrel overall rating based on the data we assessed. Florence received a more impressive city grade of B, so there are far better options in the city worth considering. We would not blame you if you are ready to stop reading and find another nursing home. However, if you want to learn more about this nursing home's category grades, nursing grades are discussed in the next section.
Additional Details:
Accepts Medicare 1 :
Accepts Medicaid 1 : 163 Beds
CCRC :
For profit - Corporation
Resident Council:
Family Council:
Medical Staff Hours Per Patient (2019)
Nurse Quality
Although we gave this facility a terrible overall grade, we awarded it a grade of B- for our nursing rating. Our nursing grade is based on numerous subcategories. The most heavily weighted factor is the quantity of hours nurses spend with residents. According to CMS records, this nursing home averaged 4 hours of nursing care per resident daily. Keep in mind that when we compute our nursing ratings, we add more weight to hours performed by nurses with a higher level of skill. Lastly, we also factored a few quality measures into our nursing grades. This place was relatively weak in some of the datapoints we look at, with below average scores for minimizing its patients' pressure ulcers and major falls. These areas are usually good measures of the quality of nursing care available.
Long-term Care Quality
We were also surprised to find that this facility earned a solid long-term care grade this year. We awarded it a B- in that category. Our long-term care grades are more meaningful for people requiring more conventional assistance related to activities of daily living. Although we determined this facility has an above average quantity of nursing hours provided by nurses and other nursing staff, we found its vaccine statistics to be somewhat low. It gave the pneumonia vaccine to just 82.38532 percent of its patients. This is a statistic we'd love to see this nursing home bring up. The last datapoint we assessed was the facility's hospitalization rate. Here we found that this place had a relatively high 3.34 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days. Neither its vaccination record nor its hospitalization rate were strengths for this facility in this category.
Short-term Care Quality
Moving on to the category of short-term care, this nursing home received a grade of just D in that area. In calculating our short-term care ratings, we assess the facility's skilled nursing services, such as those performed by registered nurses, speech therapists, physical therapists and other types of therapists. The purpose is to formulate a measure for sizing up the rehabilitation services of different nursing homes. Not surprisingly, we found that this nursing home provides far less physical therapist and registered nurse hours per resident than the average facility. The final datapoint we looked at in this area is the percentage of residents who were able to return home from the facility. This facility struggled quite a bit in this area as well, with just 34.6 percent of its residents returning home. This was quite a bit below average.
Facility Inspections
Turning to our final category of inspections, this facility received a grade that's as bad as it gets. We weight this category more heavily than our other categories. For nursing homes with poor inspection scores, you should scrutinize any severe deficiencies found on their recent inspection reports. This nursing home was hit with one category J or K deficiency, which are among the worst categories of deficiencies. These categories mean that inspectors found a deficiency which places patient health or safety in imminent jeopardy. We are also concerned by the fact that this facility was flagged by CMS for possible abuse or neglect. We prefer to avoid facilities with this designation. Please do your best to find an alternative nursing home.
Overall Rating Over Time
Compared to national and state averages across all facilities.
Commander Nursing Center Quality Metrics
Minimizes Pressure Ulcers
This tells you the percent of patients who have had a pressure ulcer. Pressure ulcers are skin damage due to staying in one position for too long.
Percent of Patients with Pressure Ulcers
Lower is Better
Minimizes Serious Falls
This indicates the percentage of patients who sustained a major fall. Falls leading to severe injury are considered by many experts to be an indicator of nursing care . Falls which result in injury are often the result of lower quality nursing care.
Percent of Patients with Serious Falls
Lower is Better
Minimizes Urinary Tract Infections
This is the percentage of residents that have had a urinary tract infection. Urinary tract infections are considered by many experts to be an indicator of nursing care at a nursing home. UTI's are routinely linked to lower quality nursing care. However, this metric could be misleading for certain nursing homes due to different reporting standards for these infections.
Percent of Patients with UTIs
Lower is Better
Appropriately Uses Anti-Psychotic Medication
This is an indication of the percent of long-term stay patients who were given antipsychotic medication. Increased usage of these drugs may mean that a facility is using these medications to subdue residents in scenarios where such medications aren't medically indicated. Nevertheless, some facilities may need to rely on these drugs due to having more patients with Alzheimer's or other dementias.
Percent of Patients
Lower is Better
Appropriately Uses Anti-Anxiety Medication
This datapoint indicates the percent of long-term residents receiving antianxiety medications.
Percent of Patients
Lower is Better
Managing Depression Among Residents
This indicates the percentage of patients who are demonstrating signs of depression.
Percent of Patients
Lower is Better
Appropriate Vaccine Usage
This is the percent of patients that were given the pneumonia and flu vaccines. Higher vaccination rates should be standard at this point.
Percent of Patients
Higher is Better
Residents Maintain Autonomy
This is the percent of patients that required more assistance with activities of daily living over time. High levels of needing for assistance with ADL's may indicate decline of a resident's health.
Percentage of Patients
Lower is Better
Ability to Keep Residents Mobile
This is the percentage of residents who retained mobility levels over time. Retaining mobility is usually a great sign for residents' health.
Percentage of Residents
Higher is Better
Hospitalizations
Measures the number of hospitalizations per 1,000 days of patient care.
Hospitalizations per 1,000 resident days
Lower is Better
Short-term Care: Rehospitalizations
This tells you the number of rehospitalizations per thousand days of short-term care. There is a correlation between avoiding hospitalizations and the quality of rehabilitation services.
Percentage of Residents Rehospitalized
Lower is Better
Short-term Care: ER Visits
This datapoint is a measure of the number of times residents are sent to the emergency room per thousand days of short-term patient care. Staying out of the emergency room is one way to assess short-term care.
Percentage of Patients
Lower is Better
Short-term Care: Facilitates Functional Improvement
This is the percent of short-term stay patients that experienced functional improvements, such as enhanced ability to perform activities of daily living. Higher levels of independence with ADL's usually correlates with superior rehabilitation services.
Percentage of Resident
Higher is Better