Cristwood Nursing and Rehabilitation

In addition to being a quality nursing home overall, this nursing home really excelled in nursing, where it received an A+. Nursing ratings are largely associated with the facility's level of nurse staffing. This nursing home boasts a really impressive 6.3 hours of nursing care per patient daily, of which a significant percentage was provided by registered nurses. This is one of the more highly trained levels of nurses. This is one of the highest totals of nursing hours we found. On top of offering high levels of care, this facility also excelled in the quality measures we looked at. By way of illustration, it performed as well as any nursing home in the nation in the area of avoiding pressure ulcers and major falls. We view these datapoints as good indicators of the quality of nursing care being provided.

This facility really excelled in the category of short-term care, where we gave it a score of A+. Only a select group of facilities performed better in this area. In the category of short-term care, we try to assess measures of a facility's rehabilitation. We analyze a nursing home's skilled nursing services, including the ones performed by registered nurses and physical and occupational therapists. This place excelled in the two key staffing areas we looked at. In fact, it offered more care from registered nurses and physical therapists than the typical nursing home. The final item we assessed in this area is the number of residents who eventually returned home from the nursing home. We found that it performed as well as just about any facility in Washington in this area with 74.2 percent of its patients returning home. With most facilities, fewer than half of their short-stay residents are able to return home.

This nursing home was awarded its third best category score in the category of long-term care. We gave this nursing home a B- in this category, which is a reasonably acceptable grade. In the area of long-term care, we focus on the quantity of care provided by a facility, rather than more sophisticated services. After assessing the very respectable amount of nursing hours and other staffing provided by this facility, we then analyzed the nursing home's vaccination records. This facility vaccinated 97.297295 percent of its residents for pneumonia, which appears to be higher than the average nursing home. This combination proved to be effective as this facility was able to keep its patients out of the hospital. In fact, it had only 0.83 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low number.

Turning our final category, inspections proved to be this facility's weakest link. It received a C in this category. Inspection ratings are based on a nursing home's inspection reports. Our inspection scores are tied to several pieces of information found on the a nursing home's recent inspection reports. Deficiencies are a key item to look for on these inspections. Severe deficiencies indicate a threat to the well being of residents. This facility had 9 deficiencies on its inspection report, but we were relieved to find that none were in categories J through L. This tells you inspectors did not consider any of the deficiencies to put patient health or safety in immediate harm or jeopardy. Overall, this inspection certainly could have been worse.