Ayden Healthcare Waterville

While we were not high on this facility's overall performance, it actually received an impressive inspection report this year with few dings from the applicable government inspectors. As a result, it received one of our better grades in that area with a B+. Perhaps the most critical factor we look at in determining our inspection scores is deficiencies. These deficiencies are found on a nursing home's recent inspection reports. It is typically best to avoid places that have too many severe deficiencies. While this facility had some minor dings on its inspection report, it had no severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are ones found in categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This tells you the inspectors did not consider any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient safety or health. A couple minor deficiencies are not necessarily the end of the world.

This facilities next best category was short-term care. We gave it a C in this category. This is essentially a middle of the road score in this category. Our short-term care scores are vital for individuals in need of rehabilitation. Rehabilitation generally utilizes more skilled nursing services. Skilled nursing means a vast spectrum of nursing services, spanning from registered nurses to physical and respiratory therapists, as well as other variations of therapy. We found that this facility was below average in the two key staffing areas we assessed. It offered fewer registered nurse and physical therapist hours per resident than most other nursing homes. It is still important to determine whether this also correlates to a lower quality of care. Finally, we assessed the number of patients who were able to return home from this nursing home. We found that 5.5 percent of this facility's patients were able to return home. This figure was quite a bit below the national average.

We gave this facility a grade of just D for our nursing rating. When calculating a facility's nursing grade, we weigh the number of hours nurses commit to residents as well as the level of licensure of the nurses. With just 0.4 hours of nursing care per resident per day, this facility's nurse staffing levels were quite a bit below average. Finally, we also looked at some nursing quality measures in calculating our nursing scores. This facility fared well when it comes to avoiding pressure ulcers and major falls.

The last area we rated is long-term care, in which this nursing home received a rock bottom grade in this area also. We gave it an F for this category, which is definitely very concerning. If you are looking for anything other than short-term rehabilitation, you should take a close look at each nursing home's long-term care ratings. Once we assessed the amount of care provided by aids and other staff, we turned to the facility's vaccination record. This facility vaccinated 98.24561 percent of its patients against pneumonia, which is more than the average nursing home. To our surprise, this nursing home also fared well at keeping its patients out of the hospital. Indeed, it had just 0 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days. Unfortunately, some of its other scores in this category were not as favorable as these.