Life Care Center of Boise

Although we did not have many positive things to say about this facility's overall grade, it did receive a somewhat respectable inspection report this year. As a result, it received a decent grade in that area with a B-. Inspection ratings account for several factors included in a facility's inspection reports. One key criteria we look at is the number and severity of deficiencies. While this place had a few deficiencies on its inspection report, none were severe based on CMS' scale. Finally, CMS cited this nursing home for possible abuse or neglect. Hopefully, its performance improves in the future, but until then we simply can't recommend this facility.

One of the other reasons we rated this facility so highly is that it earned a very impressive nursing rating. In that area, we gave this nursing home an B-. When determining our nursing grades, we analyze both the number of hours nurses spend with residents and the skill levels of the nurses. This nursing home provides only 0.4 hours of nursing care per patient each day. This is a somewhat alarming figure as it is well below average. Finally, nursing ratings also consider quality-based metrics, such as avoiding major falls. Despite not having the highest total nursing hours, this facility performed admirably in the metric of preventing major falls. This is typically a reliable indicator that a place has quality controls in place. Many falls could be avoided if a nursing home provides enough nurses to assist its residents.

This nursing home's next best category was short-term care. We awarded it a B- in this area. This is essentially a middle of the road score in this area. Our short-term care scores are thought to be most critical for individuals in need of rehabilitation services. Rehabilitation usually requires more skilled nursing services. This means not only nursing services, but also physical and respiratory therapy, as well as other types of therapy. In this place's case, we were surprised to learn that it actually provides less physical therapist and registered nurse hours per patient than the typical facility. The final metric we looked at in this category is the percentage of patients who were able to leave the nursing home and return home. We discovered that just 0 percent of this facility's patients were able to return home, which is below average.

The final area we graded is long-term care. This facility was awarded a B- for the area. Long-term care grades are used to judge a nursing home's performance as a traditional convalescent home, as opposed to focusing on the skilled nursing services provided by a skilled nursing facility. One of the criteria we considered on top of nurse's aid hours was vaccines. Thankfully, this nursing home administered the pneumonia vaccination to 98.5782 percent of its residents. This facility also excelled at keeping its patients out of the hospital. Indeed, it had less than one hospitalization per one thousand long-term resident days, which is an impressively low number.