Kerens Care Center

With an address in Kerens, Texas, Kerens Care Center is the lone option we identified in this area. We gave this facility an overall grade of C. A score in this range requires some solid scores. Based on our analysis, there are certainly much worse nursing homes out there. This nursing home was better in some categories than others, but it did not have any poor grades in any of the major categories discussed below. More information about these categories can be found below.

While this facility's overall grade was decent, it really fared well in the category of inspections. In fact, we awarded it a grade of A+ for that category, which is one of our best scores. Our inspection grades weigh a host of factors included in a facility's inspection reports. One of the most important criteria we look at is the quantity and severity of deficiencies. Places with better grades in this area usually have few of these severe deficiencies. Fortunately, although this facility had some minor dings on its report, it had zero severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are ones labeled as categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This tells you that CMS didn't deem any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient safety or health. A few minor deficiencies should not stop you from considering a nursing home.

Building on this facility's list of strengths, it also earned an excellent nursing score. We awarded them an impressive grade of C in this area. Our nursing rating is primarily based on a nursing home's level of nurse staffing. Based on the CMS data, this nursing home offers 3.4 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, our nursing grades also factor in some quality-focused statistics. Specifically, we look at the percent of residents who sustained pressure ulcers and major falls. We look at these metrics as good indicators of the quality of nursing care, since better care tends to reduce these problems.

The next category we analyzed was long-term care, where this facility received a grade of C in this category. In a long-term care environment, 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. One of the datapoints we considered in addition to nurse's aid hours is vaccines. Fortunately, this nursing home provided the pneumonia vaccine to 100 percent of its residents. Finally, this nursing home was able to limit hospitalizations. With only 1.63 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, this facility had fewer hospitalizations than the average nursing home.

The next area we assessed is short-term care. We gave this nursing home a grade of C in that area. Short-term care grades are often employed to gauge a nursing home's performance with rehabilitation. In order to offer good rehabilitation services, facilities generally need to offer better levels of highly skilled nursing services. Skilled nursing includes registered nurses, physical therapists, occupational therapists and other licensed professionals. Unfortunately, this facility was below average in terms of its level of physical therapy and registered nurse hours provided to its residents based on the metrics we assessed. Lastly, we assessed the number of patients that who were able to eventually return home from this nursing home. We found that 0 percent of this facility's patients were able to return home. This figure was actually well below average.