Meadowbrook Nursing Center

Meadowbrook Nursing Center is one of just two nursing homes in Pulaski, Tennessee. This nursing home received an overall grade of B+, which is a well above average rating. Based on our analysis, this nursing home has quite a bit going for it. This facility's impressive profile was highlighted by its inspection rating, which is addressed in the next paragraph.

On top of earning a strong overall rating, this facility performed even better in the area of inspections which is associated with the facility's recent government inspections. In fact, we awarded it an A for this category, which is one of our highest scores. Our inspection scores account for several factors found on a nursing home's inspection report. One key criteria we weigh heavily is the quantity and severity of deficiencies. Nursing homes with higher scores in this area usually have very few severe deficiencies. Although this nursing home had a few deficiencies on its inspection report, none of them were major deficiencies based on CMS' deficiency scale. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

Contributing to this nursing home's list of strengths, it also received a superb long-term care score. We awarded them a dominant strong of A in this area. When nursing homes receive a score in this range in this category it generally means it has plenty of staff and is a quality place to reside on a permanent basis. Once we assessed the volume of care provided by nurses, we next considered the nursing home's vaccination records. This facility vaccinated 100 percent of its residents for pneumonia, which is an impressive figure. Pneumonia sadly can be a deadly health condition for nursing home residents so we like it when a facility does not roll the dice on this issue. The last statistic we assessed was its hospitalization rate. We found that this place had 2.93 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days. Although this admittedly wasn't as favorable as most of its other scores in this category, this statistic may be skewed for some facilities due to the medical complexity of patients.

This nursing home is also strong in the area of short-term care, where it was given a score of B. It outpaced most facilities in this category. Short-term care scores are important for prospective residents in need of rehabilitation. Rehabilitation generally requires higher levels of skilled nursing services. Skilled nursing means a wide range of nursing services, ranging from registered nurses to physical and speech therapists, as well as other forms of therapy. This nursing home employs both physical therapists and registered nurses. Not all facilities employ these skilled professionals. Finally, we looked at the percentage of patients who were able to return to the community from this nursing home. This place outperformed the majority of facilities in this area with 50.9 percent of its patients returning home. This is a higher rate than most facilities.

Switching gears to the last area, this nursing home received an acceptable nursing score. While this was not as strong as many of its other category grades, this is still not a major area of concern. When calculating a facility's nursing rating, we weigh the amount of time nurses are seeing residents as well as the level of licensure of the nurses. This particular nursing home provided 3.5 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, our nursing grades also weigh quality-based measures, such as avoiding major falls. This facility performed above average in this area.