Marquette County Medical Care Facility

On top of being a great facility overall, it also received A+ government inspections in recent years. Its inspections were nearly flawless. Inspection scores are based on many items found on the a nursing home's recent inspection reports. Facilities that excel in this area tend to have very few deficiencies on those reports. Most importantly, these places should not have any severe deficiencies which are associated with risks to patient safety. This facility was assessed 3 deficiencies on its inspection report, but fortunately none of the deficiencies were considered severe. This means that CMS did not consider any of the deficiencies to cause an immediate risk to resident health or safety. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

This nursing home also received a very impressive nursing grade. In fact, this turned out to be its second best category grade. In that area, we awarded this facility a grade of A. We scrutinized the qualifications of nurses at the facility, as well as the number of hours those nurses were with patients, in calculating our grade in this area. This particular nursing home provided 0.5 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also assessed several nursing quality-based metrics 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 facility Michigan in this category. This is generally a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can frequently be prevented by providing better nursing care, such as by employing a system of moving a patient more frequently.

This facility also was awarded a impressive long-term care grade. This actually is its third best category grade. In that category, we awarded this facility a score of A. Long-term care grades in this range generally require both 24/7 care from nurses and aids, as well as quality routine medical care. In addition to looking at the amount of care provided by nurses aids and other staff, we analyzed the percentage of residents vaccinated for pneumonia. This nursing home vaccinated 99.061035 percent of its residents. Vaccines are vital to keeping residents out of the hospital. Finally, this nursing home was able to limit hospitalizations. Indeed, it had less than one hospitalization per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is an impressively low number.

The fourth category we analyzed is short-term care, where this facility received a grade of A-. This wrapped up an elite profile. Very few facilities received an A- or better in in each area we assessed. Our short-term care scores are arguably most important for residents in need of a nursing home for rehabilitation. Rehabilitation generally utilizes more skilled nursing services. Skilled nursing includes not merely nursing services, but also physical and respiratory therapy, as well as other forms of therapy. Fortunately, it looks like this facility has registered nurses on staff. Not every nursing home employs these types of nurses. However, based on the information they provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. Lastly, we looked at the number of residents who were able to return to the community from this nursing home. We found that 4.7 percent of this facility's residents returned home.