Signature Healthcare at Rockford

In addition to receiving a great overall rating, this nursing home performed even better in our inspections category which is based on the nursing home's recent inspections. In fact, we awarded it an A for that category, which is one of our best scores. Arguably the most critical factor we look at in determining our inspection ratings is deficiencies. Deficiencies can be found on a nursing home's recent inspection reports. Places with better grades in this area most likely avoided the most severe deficiencies involving patient abuse or death. Fortunately, although this nursing home had a few minor dings on its government inspection report, it had no severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are found in categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This means the inspectors did not 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 is also above average in the category of long-term care, where it was given a score of B+. It performed more favorably than most facilities in this area. For prospective residents seeking a permanent place to live as opposed to skilled nursing, long-term care grades are an important measure. Once we concluded our assessment of the quantity of care provided by nurses, we then looked at the facility's vaccination record. This nursing home vaccinated 92.71523 percent of its residents against pneumonia. 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 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is an impressively low figure.

The third area we looked at is short-term care. This facility was awarded a very positive short-term care grade, with a grade of B in the category. Our short-term care ratings are likely most meaningful for individuals needing rehabilitation services. Rehabilitation generally utilizes more skilled nursing. Skilled nursing includes not only nursing, but also physical and occupational therapy, as well as other forms of therapy. Fortunately, it looks like this nursing home employs registered nurses. Not all nursing homes employs these types of nurses. However, according to the information this nursing home provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. Lastly, we considered the percentage of residents who were able to return to the community from this nursing home. We found that 5.3 percent of this facility's residents returned home.

Switching gears to our final category, this facility received a grade of C in nursing, which is a respectable score. There are a variety of subcategories included in this grade. Many of the data points relate to nurse staffing. This nursing home averages just 0.4 hours of nursing care per resident per day. This is a very low figure. Lastly, we like to look at quality-based statistics, such as the percent of residents who sustained pressure ulcers and major falls. Sometimes these metrics are indicators of the quality of nursing care.