Dove Healthcare - South Eau Claire

On top of being an elite facility overall, this facility also performed well in the area of inspections, where it earned an A+. Few places fared this well in this category. Perhaps the most important factor we consider in computing our inspection scores is deficiencies. These deficiencies can be found on a facility's recent inspection reports. Places with better scores in this category typically dodged the more severe deficiencies involving patient abuse or death. While this facility had some minor dings on its inspection report, it had zero severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are labeled as categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This tells you that CMS did not deem 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.

This nursing home also was given an A+ for its short-term care grade. Our short-term care ratings are arguably more meaningful for folks needing rehabilitation services. Rehabilitation typically mandates more highly-skilled nursing services. Skilled nursing includes not merely nursing, but also physical and respiratory therapy, as well as other variations of therapy. Fortunately, it looks like this facility has registered nurses on staff. Not all nursing homes employs these skilled professionals. However, based on the data this nursing home provided, it does not look like the facility employs physical therapists. Finally, we considered the percentage of patients who eventually returned home from this nursing home. We found that 6.9 percent of this facility's residents returned home.

We also wanted to emphasize the fact that this facility received an impressive grade of A in our nursing category. There are quite a few subcategories within this category. Most of the criteria reflect the quantity and quality of nurse staffing. This nursing home averages 0.6 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also looked at some nursing quality-based metrics in determining our nursing grades. This nursing home performed very well in terms of avoiding pressure ulcers and major falls. We consider these areas to be good indicators of the quality of nursing care.

Moving on to the next area, this facility received a high-end long-term care rating. In fact, we gave it a grade of A in this area, resulting in this facility receiving straight A's. When nursing homes receive a score in this range in this category it generally means it has plenty of staff and is a quality place to live on a permanent basis. On top of considering the volume of care provided by nurses aids and other staff, we analyzed the number of residents vaccinated against pneumonia. This facility gave the vaccine to 96.77419 percent of its residents. Vaccines are vital to keeping residents out of the hospital. Clearly, this place is doing something right in this area as it was able to keep its residents out of the hospital. In fact, it had less than one hospitalization per one thousand long-term resident days, which is an impressively low figure.