Fremont Healthcare Center

Although we were not high on this facility overall, we awarded it a grade of B- for our inspections rating. This grade is better than the place's overall grade. We would argue that one of the most important factors in assessing an inspection report is deficiencies. We especially look at the severity of the deficiencies. This nursing home received 5 deficiencies on its inspection report, but fortunately none were considered to be severe. This indicates that CMS did not deem any of these deficiencies an imminent threat to resident safety or health. Lastly, this facility was flagged by CMS for possible abuse or neglect. We prefer to avoid facilities with this designation. Please do your best to find an alternative nursing home.

We awarded this facility a respectable grade in the area of nursing as well, with a grade of B-. Nursing ratings are largely associated with a nursing home's level of nurse staffing. This facility provided just 0.4 hours of nursing care per patient each day. This is a relatively low total compared to most other facilities. Lastly, we also looked at some nursing quality-based metrics. Although this nursing home got docked a bit for nursing hours per resident, it excelled in a few of these quality-based measures. With less than five percent of its patients suffering from pressure ulcers, it did well in this statistic. This is typically a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can frequently be prevented by offering better nursing care, such as by having a protocol of turning a resident more often.

We also awarded this facility a decent grade in the area of short-term care, where it received a B-. In determining our short-term care ratings, we assess the facility's skilled nursing services, including those performed by registered nurses, occupational therapists, physical therapists and other types of therapists. Our goal is to create a measure for comparing the rehabilitation services of different facilities. We found that this place was below average in the two key staffing areas we looked at. It provided fewer physical therapist and registered nurse hours per resident than most other nursing homes. It is still important to determine whether this also correlates to a lower quality of care. The last statistic we considered in this area is the number of residents who were able to leave the nursing home and return home. We discovered that just 5.9 percent of this facility's patients were able to return home, which is actually below average.

Moving on to the fourth category, this facility was given a B- in long-term care, which is generally a decent rating. In the area of long-term care, we look at the amount of services offered by a nursing home, as opposed to more medically-intensive services. After assessing the volume of care provided by aids and other staff, we then analyzed the facility's vaccination data. We were pleased to learn that this nursing home vaccinated 100 percent of its residents for pneumonia. This place keeps its patients out of the hospital. In fact, it had only 0.03 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is an impressively low number.