Edenbrook of Oshkosh

This facility received a solid overall grade as described above, but we really wanted to point out its nearly flawless inspections in recent years. We gave them an impressive grade of A in this category. Our inspection scores account for a host of factors found on a facility's inspection report. One of the most important criteria we rely on is the number and severity of deficiencies. Nursing homes with better grades in this area generally have few severe deficiencies. This facility received 4 deficiencies on its inspection report, but we were relieved to see that none of the deficiencies were considered to be major deficiencies. This tells you that the government inspectors didn't deem any of these deficiencies to create an imminent threat to resident health or safety. A few minor deficiencies shouldn't lead you to cross a nursing home off your list.

In addition, we also wanted to draw your attention to the fact that this facility was given favorable short-term care marks in this assessment. We gave them one of our more impressive grades in that category, with a B. This turned out to be the nursing home's second strongest score. In determining our short-term care ratings, we quantify the nursing home's skilled nursing services, including those performed by registered nurses, speech therapists, physical therapists and other types of therapists. Our objective is to create a barometer for sizing up the rehabilitation services of various nursing homes. Fortunately, it looks like this nursing home has registered nurses on staff. Not all nursing homes employs these skilled professionals. However, according to the data they provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. The final measure we assessed in this area is the number of patients that returned home from the nursing home. We found that 5.6 percent of this nursing home's residents returned home as opposed to remaining at the nursing home on a permanent basis.

We also gave this nursing home a decent score in the category of nursing care, with a grade of C. There are quite a few factors included in this grade. Many of the criteria reflect the quantity of nurse staffing. This facility provides 0.3 hours of nursing care per patient each day. This is a lower figure than we are used to seeing. Despite having low quantities of nursing care, this facility actually fared better in some of the quality-based metrics we assessed. It performed well when it comes to minimizing its residents' pressure ulcers and major falls. We consider these areas to be measures of the quality of nursing care. In some cases, the quality of nursing care is every bit as important as the number of hours of care offered.

This facility's weakest area was long-term care, which is the final area we looked at. For this category, we gave this facility a grade of just D. Long-term care grades of this caliber generally are a bad sign for the quantity and quality of care provided by nurses and aids. On top of assessing the amount of care provided by aids and other staff, we also looked at the number of residents vaccinated against pneumonia. This facility administered the vaccine to 92.18107 percent of its patients, which is somewhat less than we were hoping for. To our surprise, this facility actually fared well at keeping its residents out of the hospital. Indeed, it had only 0.02 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days. This was its best feature in this category.