Fort Valley Health and Rehab

This facility received a quality overall score as described above, but we especially wanted to emphasize its nearly flawless government inspections in recent years. We awarded it an A in this category. These inspection scores weigh several factors, including deficiencies and federal fines. You can learn more about each of these factors by obtaining copies of nursing homes' inspection reports. While this nursing home had some minor dings on its inspection report, it had zero severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are those found in categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This means that the inspectors didn't consider 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 facility was awarded strong scores in the area of long-term care as well. As a result, it received one of our highest grades in that category with a area of A-. For long-term care residents, the primary goal is to keep patients as healthy and safe as possible. This is different than skilled nursing or short-term care where the goal is to rehabilitate residents. After looking at the amount of care provided by nurses and other staff, we then analyzed the facility's vaccination statistics. This facility vaccinated 76.388885 percent of its residents against pneumonia, which happens to be a few points below what we were hoping for but still a respectable figure. While its vaccination rate was a bit lower than we had hoped, this place was able to limit hospitalizations. Indeed, it had less than one hospitalization per one thousand long-term resident days, which is an impressively low figure.

Next, we looked at the nursing category where we awarded this nursing home a grade of B-. This facility didn't perform quite as well in this category as it did in some other categories. Nevertheless, this is still a respectable score. Our nursing grade is based on the nursing home's nurse staffing levels. We factor in both the levels of skill of the nurses as well as the quantity of hours spent with residents. This nursing home averages just 0.3 hours of nursing care per resident per day. This is a very low figure. Finally, we also looked at some nursing quality measures. While this place got docked a bit for its nursing hours per resident, it excelled in some of these quality-based measures. With less than five percent of its patients suffering from pressure ulcers, it fared very well in this area. This is often a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can frequently be prevented by providing better nursing care, such as employing a protocol of turning residents at least once a day.

The last category we looked at is short-term care, proved to be this nursing home's worst area. We awarded this facility a D in that category. This really was one of just a few weak points on a strong report card. In the category of short-term care, we seek to qualify measures of a nursing home's rehabilitation services. We assess a facility's skilled nursing services, such as the ones performed by registered nurses and physical and occupational therapists. Unfortunately, we found that this place provides less physical therapist and registered nurse hours per patient than most other nursing homes. Lastly, we assessed the number of residents who were able to return to the community from this nursing home. We found that just 0 percent of this facility's residents returned home.