Galena Nursing & Rehab Center

This nursing home received a quality overall grade as described above, but we especially would like to point out its nearly flawless inspections in recent years. We gave them an impressive grade of A+ in this area. Inspection grades account for a host of factors found on a facility's inspection report. One of the most important criteria we consider is the number and severity of deficiencies. Nursing homes with higher grades in this category typically have few of these severe deficiencies. While this place had a few minor dings on its report, it had zero severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are ones found in categories G through L. This means that the government inspectors didn't consider any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient safety or health. Keep in mind that deficiency-free inspection reports are uncommon in the industry.

This facility received a strong long-term care score as well. We gave it one of our better grades in that category with a grade of B. Facilities that receive this kind of score in long-term care tend to provide consistent 24/7 care to ensure residents are well cared for. In addition to looking at the quantity of care provided by nurses and other staff, we analyzed the number of residents vaccinated for pneumonia. This facility gave the vaccine to 100 percent of its patients, which is what we like to see. Pneumonia sadly can be a life threatening illness for nursing home residents so we prefer when a facility doesn't leave this to chance. Lastly, this nursing home was able to limit hospitalizations. It had only 0.02 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low figure.

This nursing home's third most favorable area ended up being short-term care. In that category, we awarded this facility a grade of B-. In our short-term care rating, we endeavor to forge a fair gauge for rehabilitation. In this process, we analyze a nursing home's scope of highly-skilled nursing services, including both registered nurses and physical therapy, as well as respiratory therapy. Fortunately, it looks like this facility has registered nurses on staff. Not all facilities employs these types of nurses. However, according to the information this nursing home provided, it does not look like the facility employs physical therapists. The final datapoint we looked at in this area is the number of residents that who were able to eventually return home from the nursing home. We found that just 5.4 percent of this facility's patients returned home.

The next category we graded was nursing. We awarded it a C in that category. This is a fair grade in this area. In determining our nursing grades, we assess both nursing hours and the training levels of those nurses. This nursing home provides 0.4 hours of nursing care per resident each day. This is a much lower figure than we were hoping for. Finally, we also baked a few quality measures into our nursing grades. This nursing home was subpar in two of the major metrics we focus on, with below average scores for minimizing its patients' major falls and pressure ulcers. These areas are typically good measures of the quality of nursing care provided.