Madison Health and Rehabilitation Center

On top of being an elite nursing home overall, this nursing home excelled in our inspections category, where it earned an A+. Few nursing homes fared as well in this category. Inspection grades weigh several factors found on a facility's inspection reports. One of the most important criteria we consider is the number and severity of deficiencies. Places with higher scores in this area typically have few severe deficiencies. This nursing home received 4 deficiencies on its inspection report, but we were relieved to see that none were considered to be severe. This tells you that CMS did not deem any of these deficiencies to create an imminent risk to resident health or safety. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

One of the other reasons we rated this facility so highly is that it earned a very impressive nursing score. In fact, nursing turned out to be its second best category grade. In that area, we awarded this nursing home an A. Nursing grades are mostly based on a facility's nurse staffing. This nursing home provides 0.5 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also assessed several nursing quality measures and this nursing home excelled in some of these areas. With less than five percent of its residents sustaining pressure ulcers, it performed as well as any nursing home the state in this category. This is generally a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can often be prevented by providing better nursing care, such as having a protocol of turning a patient at least once a day.

We also want to point out the fact that this nursing home was given a first-rate grade of A in our long-term care area. When nursing homes receive a grade in this range in this category it generally means it's well-staffed and is a quality place to live on a permanent basis. Once we concluded our assessment of the quantity of care provided by nurses, we then looked at the nursing home's vaccination data. This nursing home vaccinated 100 percent of its patients for pneumonia, which is very impressive. Pneumonia sadly is often a dangerous health condition for nursing home residents so we strongly prefer when a nursing home doesn't roll the dice on this issue. Lastly, this nursing home was able to limit hospitalizations. Indeed, it had only 0.02 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low figure.

The next category we scored turned out to be this facility's worst area. Nevertheless, even its weakest link would actually be a highlight for most facilities. We gave it a strong grade of B for our short-term care category. Our short-term care grades are meaningful for residents seeking rehabilitation. Rehabilitation generally mandates more highly-skilled nursing services. This means a broad spectrum of nursing services, ranging from registered nurses to physical and occupational therapists, as well as other types of therapy. Fortunately, it appear that this nursing home has registered nurses on staff. Not all facilities employs these skilled professionals. However, according to the data they provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. The final item we assessed in this category is the percentage of patients that eventually returned home from the nursing home. We found that 3.7 percent of this nursing home's patients returned home as opposed to remaining at the nursing home on a permanent basis.