Riverside Healthcare Center

Although we gave this facility a terrible overall grade, we awarded it a grade of C for our nursing rating. Our nursing grade weighs numerous factors. The most heavily weighted factor is the amount of time nurses spend with residents. This nursing home averages just 0.3 hours of nursing care per patient daily, which is well below average. Finally, we also assessed several nursing quality measures. Although this facility got dinged a bit for nursing hours per resident, it actually excelled in some of these quality metrics. With less than five percent of its patients experiencing pressure ulcers, it did remarkably well in this metric. This is often a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can typically be avoided by offering better nursing care, such as employing a system of turning patients more frequently.

Surprisingly, we awarded this facility a grade of C for its short-term care grade, which really isn't a bad grade. Our short-term care ratings are vital for prospective residents in need of rehabilitation. Rehabilitation typically mandates more highly-skilled nursing services. This includes a wide spectrum of nursing services, spanning from registered nurses to physical and speech therapists, as well as other forms of therapy. In this nursing home's case, we were surprised to learn that it actually provides less physical therapist and registered nurse hours per patient than the average facility. The hope is that this does not adversely impact the quality of care. Lastly, we looked at the number of patients who were able to return to the community from this facility. We found that 0 percent of this facility's residents returned home. At most facilities, closer to half of their residents are able to return home so this figure is below average.

Another issue was the F this facility received in the category of long-term care. Facilities that do not fare well in this category often do not provide as much nursing care and also may be lagging in some of the areas of routine personal care we assessed. Once we finished looking at the volume of care provided by nurses, we then looked at the facility's vaccination statistics. We were a bit concerned this nursing home vaccinated just 79.03226 percent of its patients for pneumonia. Surprisingly, this place was actually able to limit hospitalizations. With just 0.05 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, this nursing home has less hospitalizations than the majority of nursing homes. This was its best feature in this category.

Turning our final category of inspections, this nursing home received an F here. For facilities that received this bad of an inspection score, we recommend scrutinizing the severe deficiencies on its inspection report. This nursing home had 8 deficiencies by government inspectors. The only positive thing we can say is that none of its deficiencies were in the categories that suggest they caused a threat to resident safety or health. Lastly, we also need to draw your attention to the fact that this nursing home was assessed large government fines amounting to over $100,000. This typically suggests that a poor track record spanned several years.