Deerfield Retirement Community

In addition to receiving a great overall grade, this nursing home received an A+ in the area of long-term care. Facilities that excel in this category tend to provide patients with closer supervision and stay on top of routine medical care. Once we concluded our assessment of the amount of care provided by nurses, we then analyzed the nursing home's vaccination statistics. This nursing home vaccinated 100 percent of its residents against pneumonia, which is what we like to see. Pneumonia sadly is often a dangerous ailment for nursing home patients so we like it when a nursing home doesn't roll the dice on this issue. Finally, this facility was able to limit hospitalizations. It had only 0 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low number.

This nursing home also received an A+ nursing grade, making it one of the few nursing homes to receive multiple A+ category grades. Our nursing rating is mostly tied to a facility's level of nurse staffing. This nursing home provides 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 place the state in this category. This is generally a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can frequently be prevented by providing better nursing care, such as having a policy of moving a resident more often.

Building on its strong resume, this facility also was awarded a strong short-term care score, with a grade of A. Our short-term care scores are meaningful for prospective residents looking for rehabilitation. Rehabilitation usually mandates more highly-skilled nursing. Skilled nursing means a broad scope of nursing services, spanning from registered nurses to physical and respiratory therapists, as well as other variations of therapy. Fortunately, it appear that this nursing home employs registered nurses. Not all nursing homes employs these skilled professionals. On the other hand, based on the data they provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. The last item we looked at in this area is the percentage of residents who were able to leave the nursing home and return home. We discovered that 6.6 percent of this facility's residents were able to return home.

Adding to its impressive category grades, this nursing home also excelled in the area of inspections, where it received an impressive grade of A. This wrapped up a straight A report card for this place. Our inspection ratings are based on many items located in the a nursing home's recent inspection reports. Nursing homes that score well in this category have very few deficiencies on their reports. Most importantly, these places generally do not have any severe deficiencies which are associated with risks to patient safety. While this nursing home had a few deficiencies on its report, none of them were major deficiencies based on CMS' deficiency scale. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.