NHC HealthCare Mauldin

To pair with a favorable overall grade, we awarded this facility an A+ for our inspections rating. Inspection ratings weigh several factors included in a nursing home's inspection report. One of the most important criteria we weigh heavily is the number and severity of deficiencies. Places with better grades in this category usually have few of these severe deficiencies. This particular nursing home had just a single deficiency on its inspection report and it was not one deemed to pose a threat to patient health or safety. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

We also wanted to point out the fact that this nursing home fared very well in our long-term care category. We gave them an exemplary grade of A+ in this area. When nursing homes receive this type of score in long-term care it is usually a good sign for patient care and indicates that the facility is well-staffed with nurses aids. On top of considering the volume of care provided by nurses aids and other staff, we also looked at the number of residents vaccinated against pneumonia. This facility provided the vaccine to 100 percent of its residents, which is significantly higher than most nursing homes. Clearly, this nursing home is doing something right in this area as it also excelled at keeping its patients out of the hospital. It had less than one hospitalization per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low figure.

This facility also received a dominant short-term care score. In fact, this ended up being this facility's third strongest category score. In that area, this facility received a grade of A. In our short-term care assessment, we attempt to forge a valuable measure for rehabilitation services. In this process, we assess the facility's offerings of skilled nursing services, including both registered nurses and physical therapy, as well as occupational therapy. Fortunately, it appear that this facility employs registered nurses. Not every nursing home employs these types of nurses. On the other hand, according to the data they provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. Finally, we assessed the percentage of patients who were able to return to the community from this nursing home. We found that 6.3 percent of this facility's residents returned home.

Moving on to our final category, this facility also performed admirably in the nursing category. In fact, we gave it an A- for that category. This rounded out truly elite profile. Our nursing score looks at the nursing home's nurse staffing levels. We factor in both the levels of licensure of those nurses and the number of hours spent with patients. 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 place 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 often be avoided if more nurses aids and better safety protocols are in place.