Lakepoint Augusta

Although we did not rate this facility well overall, we want to point out its decent grade of B- in the category of short-term care. In computing our short-term care grades, we analyze the nursing home's levels of highly skilled nursing services, which includes registered nurses, physical therapists respiratory therapists and other types of therapists. This score is more often than not a fair measure of a facility's rehabilitation services. In this facility's case, we were surprised to learn that it actually provides less physical therapist and registered nurse hours per resident than the average facility. The hope is that this does not adversely impact the quality of care. Lastly, we looked at the number of patients who were able to return to the community from this facility. We found that 4.9 percent of this facility's patients returned home. At most nursing homes, closer to half of their residents are able to return home so this figure is below average.

We awarded this nursing home a grade of C for our inspections rating. This score is more respectable than the facility's overall grade. These inspection grades take several factors into consideration, including deficiencies, substantiated complaints and federal fines. You can learn more about each of these items by reviewing copies of nursing homes' inspection reports. To our surprise, this facility was hit with a category J through K deficiency, which are some of the worst possible categories of deficiencies. This often indicates that CMS uncovered a deficiency which placed patient health or safety in immediate danger. Another area of concern is that CMS flagged this nursing home for possible abuse or neglect. This is not what you want to see. We advise you to direct your search elsewhere.

This facility's next best category was nursing, but even there it received a grade of just D. This is still a well below average grade. The nursing grade is based on a handful of subcategories, however, the primary consideration is the quantity of nurse hours spent with patients. This place averaged just 0.3 hours of nursing care per patient daily. This statistic is far below average. Finally, we also looked at some nursing quality measures in calculating our nursing scores. This nursing home fared well in the area of avoiding pressure ulcers and major falls. We consider these datapoints to be indicators of the quality of nursing care.

This nursing home's least impressive area was long-term care, which is the last category we analyzed. In this category, we awarded this facility a D. For residents seeking a permanent residence as opposed to skilled nursing, long-term care grades are an important measure. In addition to considering the quantity of care provided by nurses aids and other staff, we analyzed the percentage of residents vaccinated for pneumonia. This nursing home administered the vaccine to 99.40476 percent of its residents. To our surprise, this place was able to keep its residents out of the hospital. It had only 0.01 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days. Unfortunately, a few of its other scores in this category weren't as favorable as these.