Diversicare of Riverchase

Diversicare of Riverchase is a large nursing home located in Birmingham, Alabama. We gave this facility an overall grade of C. A score of this caliber requires some decent scores. Birmingham received a city grade of B+, so there are other options in the city worth looking at. The best part of this place's profile was its exemplary inspection rating. Inspection grades are discussed in the next paragraph.

While this nursing home's overall grade was not bad, it really excelled in the area of inspections. In fact, we awarded it a grade of A for that category, which is one of our highest scores. Perhaps the most important factor we look at in determining our inspection grades is deficiencies. Deficiencies can be found on a nursing home's inspection reports. Facilities with higher grades in this category typically dodged the more severe deficiencies involving things like patient abuse. While this facility had some minor dings on its report, it had no severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are those found in categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This tells you the government inspectors did not deem any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient health or safety. A few minor deficiencies shouldn't lead you to cross a nursing home off your list.

This nursing home's second most favorable area came in the area of long-term care. In that area, we awarded this facility a B-. In the category of long-term care, we focus on the quantity of services offered by a facility, as opposed to more sophisticated services. In addition to considering the quantity of care provided by aids and other staff, we also looked at the number of residents vaccinated against pneumonia. This facility vaccinated 82.85714 percent of its patients. This is quite a bit less than what we expected. Finally, we looked at the nursing home's number of hospitalizations. With 1.97 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, this facility is also below average.

We also gave this nursing home a decent score in the category of nursing care, with a grade of C. Our nursing rating is largely based on the facility's level of nurse staffing. This nursing home provides 3 hours of nursing care per resident per day. This is a much lower figure than we are used to seeing. Finally, our nursing scores also factor in some quality-focused measures. We especially like to look at the percent of patients who sustained pressure ulcers and major falls. These metrics are indicators of the quality of nursing care, since better care can reduce these problems.

This facility's weakest category was short-term care, which is the last area we analyzed. For this area, we awarded this nursing home a grade of just D. In our short-term care category, we endeavor to craft a fair gauge for rehabilitation services. In doing so, we look at the nursing home's levels of skilled nursing services, including both registered nurses and physical therapy, as well as occupational therapy. With its poor grade in this area, we weren't stunned to discover that this nursing home provides far fewer physical therapist and registered nurse hours per patient than most other facilities. The last statistic we considered in this category is the percentage of residents that returned home from the nursing home. This facility a bit in this metric as well, with just 45.3 percent of its patients returning home. Unfortunately, this was below average.