D'youville Senior Care
981 Varnum Avenue, Lowell MA 01854 · (978) 454-5681 · 95.28% estimated occupancy 1Updated: Aug 1, 2020 · By Sara Levinsohn
D'youville Senior Care is one of eight available facilities located in Lowell, Massachusetts. We awarded this nursing home world class overall rating of A. In fact, it turned out to be ranked among the top three facilities in the city. This is just about as good of a place as you're going to find. If you look below, you will see this nursing home's category scores, which are just as strong as its overall grade.
Additional Details:
Accepts Medicare 1 :
Accepts Medicaid 1 : 208 Beds
CCRC :
Non profit - Corporation
Resident Council:
Family Council:
Medical Staff Hours Per Patient (2019)
Facility Inspections
In addition to being a great overall grade, this facility also received A+ health inspections in recent years. Its inspections were virtually flawless. Arguably the most important factor we consider in calculating our inspection scores is deficiencies. Deficiencies are found on a nursing home's inspection reports. Places with higher grades in this area most likely avoided the more severe deficiencies involving patient abuse or death. While this facility had some deficiencies on its inspection report, none were severe based on CMS' scale. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.
Nurse Quality
We also wanted to emphasize the fact that this facility received an impressive grade of A in our nursing category. Our nursing grade is mostly associated with a nursing home's level of nurse staffing. This nursing home offers extremely high levels of nursing care, averaging 4.2 hours per patient each day. This is more nursing care than nearly any other place provides. Finally, this nursing home also excelled in several of the quality measures we assessed. With less than five percent of its residents suffering from pressure ulcers, it performed as well as any facility the country in this category. This is generally an indicator that a facility has reliable quality controls in place. Many pressure ulcers can be avoided by offering better nursing care and having a protocol of turning patients even once per day.
Long-term Care Quality
Turning the page to our third area, we gave this facility a score of A- for its long-term care score. This is a dominant grade. For residents in need of a permanent residence rather than skilled nursing, long-term care is a very important category. Even though we determined this facility had a favorable amount of nursing hours provided by nurses and other nursing staff, we found its vaccination rate to be a bit low. It gave the pneumonia vaccine to just 80.6993 percent of its patients. This is one statistic we would like to see this nursing home improve on. Fortunately, this facility excelled at keeping its patients out of the hospital. In fact, it had only 1.1 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days, which is a significantly better hospitalization rate than most nursing homes.
Short-term Care Quality
In our final area, this facility also received an impressive short-term care score, with a grade of A-. This finished off a first-rate report card. Our short-term care scores are considered to be most important for individuals requiring rehabilitation from their nursing home. Rehabilitation usually mandates more skilled nursing. Skilled nursing includes not just nursing, but also physical and respiratory therapy, as well as other forms of therapy. This nursing home employs both physical therapists and registered nurses. Not all facilities employ these skilled professionals. The last metric we assessed in this area is the percentage of residents that ultimately returned home from the facility. This place performed as well as just about any facility in Massachusetts in this area with 56.4 percent of its patients returning home. For most facilities, fewer than half of their short-term residents are able to return home.
Overall Rating Over Time
Compared to national and state averages across all facilities.
D'youville Senior Care Quality Metrics
Minimizes Pressure Ulcers
This is the percentage of residents who sustained a pressure ulcer. Pressure ulcers, which are also called bed sores, are routinely caused by patients not being moved frequently enough. Better nursing protocols minimizes the percentage of residents in a nursing home who sustain pressure ulcers.
Percent of Patients with Pressure Ulcers
Lower is Better
Minimizes Serious Falls
This is the percentage of residents who sustained a major fall. Falls leading to major injury are often the result of lower levels of patient supervision. More supervision can limit the percentage of residents in a nursing home who sustain major falls.
Percent of Patients with Serious Falls
Lower is Better
Minimizes Urinary Tract Infections
This is the percentage of residents who sustained a urinary tract infection. These infections are sometimes associated with insufficient hygiene.
Percent of Patients with UTIs
Lower is Better
Appropriately Uses Anti-Psychotic Medication
This statistic measures the percentage of long-term care patients receiving antipsychotic medications. While antipsychotic drugs serve an important medical purpose, it is important to make sure these drugs are being used appropriately. In limited cases, high levels of antipsychotic drug use may mean a nursing home is using these medications to control patient behavior.
Percent of Patients
Lower is Better
Appropriately Uses Anti-Anxiety Medication
This tells you the percent of patients who were given antianxiety drugs. These drugs are commonly prescribed to residents suffering from anxiety or depression.
Percent of Patients
Lower is Better
Managing Depression Among Residents
This indicates the percentage of residents demonstrating depressive symptoms. High levels of depression could be an indicator worse patient care.
Percent of Patients
Lower is Better
Appropriate Vaccine Usage
This tells you the percentage of patients who were given the pneumonia and flu vaccines. High vaccination rates should be the norm at this point.
Percent of Patients
Higher is Better
Residents Maintain Autonomy
This metric is a measure of the percentage of long-term care residents who needed more assistance with activities of daily living over time. ADL's include activities such as dressing and taking a bath.
Percentage of Patients
Lower is Better
Ability to Keep Residents Mobile
This datapoint measures the percent of long-term stay patients who retained mobility levels.
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 indicates the number of times residents are rehospitalized per 1,000 days of short-term care. There is typically a correlation between reduced hospitalizations and a nursing home's quality of short-term rehabilitation.
Percentage of Residents Rehospitalized
Lower is Better
Short-term Care: ER Visits
This metric is a measure of the number of emergency room visits per thousand days of short-term patient care. Avoiding medical emergencies is one way to assess patient care during rehabilitation.
Percentage of Patients
Lower is Better
Short-term Care: Facilitates Functional Improvement
This indicates the percent of short-term residents who saw functional improvements, such as enhanced ability to perform activities of daily living. High levels of performance with ADL's often correlates with successful rehabilitation services.
Percentage of Resident
Higher is Better