Medilodge of Alpena

On top of faring well overall, this nursing home received even higher grades in the category of short-term care. In fact, it received one of our highest grades in that area with a score of A-. In the category of short-term care, we endeavor to qualify indicators of a nursing home's rehabilitation services. We analyze the nursing home's skilled nursing services, such as those performed by registered nurses and physical and occupational therapists. Fortunately, it looks like this nursing home employs registered nurses. Not every nursing home employs these skilled professionals. However, based on the information they provided, it does not look like the facility employs physical therapists. The final measure we looked at in this area is the number of residents who ultimately were able to return home from the facility. We found that 5.4 percent of this nursing home's patients returned home as opposed to remaining at the nursing home on a permanent basis.

In addition, this nursing home excelled in inspections, where it received a grade of B+. We take several aspects of a facility's inspection report into consideration in determining our inspection scores. One key factor is health deficiencies. You should keep in mind that the severity of deficiencies is arguably more important than the quantity of deficiencies, as some of these end up being relatively minor. This nursing home was assessed 5 deficiencies on its inspection report, but we were relieved to see that none of the deficiencies were considered severe. This tells you that the government inspectors didn't deem any of these deficiencies to pose an immediate threat to patient health or safety. We should note that deficiency-free inspection reports are uncommon in the industry.

This facility is also strong in the area of nursing, where it received a grade of B. It outperformed most nursing homes in this category. The nursing grade assesses a handful of components, most of which are tied to quantities of nurse staffing. This nursing home provides 0.4 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, our nursing grades also factor in quality-based assessments, such as avoiding major falls. This facility performed well in this area. Avoiding major falls is typically a good indicator that a place has reliable quality controls in place. Major falls can many times be avoided if more nurses aids and better safety protocols are in place.

Our next category is long-term care, in which we gave this facility a grade of C in that category. In determining these long-term care ratings, we quantify the facility's ability to maintain its permanent residents' health and quality of life. In addition to assessing the amount of care provided by aids and other staff, we looked at the number of residents vaccinated against pneumonia. Thankfully, this nursing home provided the vaccine to 99.12023 percent of its patients, which is a very respectable statistic. This nursing home was able to keep its patients out of the hospital. It had only 0.01 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is an impressively low number.