Eunice C Smith Nursing Home

On top of earning a strong overall score, this nursing home fared well in short-term care. We awarded it an A for that category. Our short-term care ratings are based on the nursing home's quantity of skilled skilled healthcare professionals. This includes a broad scope of services, ranging from registered nurses to physical and respiratory therapists, not to mention other types of therapy. Fortunately, it looks like this facility has registered nurses on staff. Not all nursing homes employs these types of nurses. On the other hand, based on the data this nursing home provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. Finally, we looked at the percentage of patients that ultimately returned home from this facility. We found that 6.1 percent of this nursing home's patients returned home.

Adding to its impressive category grades, we awarded this nursing home a grade of B+ for our inspections rating. Inspection grades take several factors into consideration, including deficiencies and federal fines. You can find more information about each of these factors by reviewing copies of nursing homes' inspection reports. While this nursing home had a few minor dings on its government inspection report, it had no severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are those labeled as categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This means that CMS didn't consider any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient safety or health. The fact that none of the deficiencies were severe made us feel better about this inspection report.

Another strong feature for this facility is that it received an impressive nursing grade. In that area, we awarded this facility a grade of B. In determining our nursing scores, we weigh both nursing hours and the levels of licensure of the nurses. This nursing home averages 0.5 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also looked at several nursing quality-based metrics and this place excelled in some of these areas. With less than five percent of its residents sustaining pressure ulcers, it performed as well as any facility the state in this category. This is generally a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can typically be avoided by providing better nursing care, such as by having a policy of moving a patient more frequently.

The final category we analyzed was long-term care. This nursing home was given a grade of C for the category. In the area of long-term care, we focus more on the quantity of care provided by a nursing home, rather than more healthcare-oriented services. Once we assessed the volume of care provided by nurses aids and other staff, we next considered the facility's vaccination record. We were a bit alarmed this facility vaccinated 89.0625 percent of its patients for pneumonia, which happens to be significantly lower than what we were hoping for. On a more positive note, this facility was able to limit hospitalizations. In fact, it had only 0 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low number.