Mid-Valley Health Care Center

One of the reasons this ended up being a quality nursing home is that it received an impressive inspection score. In fact, inspections turned out to be its best category grade. In that area, we gave it an A. Perhaps the most important factor we look at in determining our inspection ratings is deficiencies. These deficiencies are found on a facility's recent inspection reports. Nursing homes with higher scores in this area most likely dodged the more severe deficiencies involving health risks or even death. While this nursing home had a few minor dings on its report, it had zero severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are labeled as categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This means CMS didn't consider any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient health or safety. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

This nursing home also was given an impressive long-term care grade. In fact, we gave it an above average grade of B+ in this category. Facilities that receive this kind of score in this category typically provide consistent around the clock care to ensure residents are kept in good health. After assessing the volume of care provided by aids and other staff, we turned to the facility's vaccination data. This facility vaccinated 95.57522 percent of its patients for pneumonia. Vaccines are vital to keeping patients out of the hospital. Clearly, this place is doing something right in this area as it also excelled at keeping its residents out of the hospital. It had only 0.01 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days, which is an impressively low figure.

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. Our nursing grade assesses the facility's nurse staffing levels. We weigh both the levels of skill of those nurses and the number of hours spent with patients. This nursing home averages 0.3 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, our nursing grades also factor in quality-based assessments, such as avoiding major falls. This nursing home performed well in this area. Avoiding major falls is typically a good indicator that a nursing home has reliable quality controls in place. Major falls can many times be prevented if more nurses aids and better safety protocols are in place.

The final category we scored is short-term care. We gave this facility a grade of C in this category. In the area of short-term care, we endeavor to evaluate measures of a nursing home's rehabilitation. We look at the facility's skilled nursing services, such as the ones performed by registered nurses and various therapists. Fortunately, it looks like this facility has registered nurses on staff. Not all facilities employs these skilled professionals. On the other hand, according to the data this nursing home provided, it does not look like the facility employs physical therapists. The final metric we considered in this category is the percentage of residents who were able to leave the facility and return to the community. We discovered that just 4.2 percent of this facility's patients were able to return home, which is actually below average.