Southern Ocean Center

One of the reasons this turned out to be a great nursing home is that it earned a very impressive long-term care score. In fact, this was its best category. In that category, we gave this facility an A. Facilities that receive this kind of grade in this category tend to provide consistent 24/7 care to make sure patients are well cared for. In addition to looking at the volume of care provided by nurses and other staff, we also looked at the number of residents vaccinated for pneumonia. This nursing home vaccinated 99.45355 percent of its residents. Vaccines are vital to keeping patients out of the hospital. Finally, this place was able to limit hospitalizations. In fact, it had only 0.01 hospitalizations per one thousand long-term resident days, which is an impressively low number.

This facility has received near flawless health inspections in recent years. We awarded them an impressive grade of A- in this category. Inspection scores are tied to several datapoints found on the a nursing home's government inspections. Places that score well in this area typically have very few deficiencies on their reports. Most importantly, these nursing homes should not have any severe deficiencies which are associated with endangerment of patients. This nursing home received 3 deficiencies on its inspection report, but we were relieved to see that none of the deficiencies were considered to be severe. This means that the inspectors didn't deem any of the deficiencies an imminent threat to resident health or safety. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

This facility also received a top-shelf short-term care grade. In fact, this turned out to be this facility's third strongest category grade. In that area, we awarded this facility a score of A-. With our short-term care rating, we seek to forge a meaningful gauge for rehabilitation services. In doing so, we assess a facility's level of highly-skilled nursing services, including both registered nurses and physical therapy, as well as respiratory therapy. Fortunately, it looks like this nursing home has registered nurses on staff. Not every facility employs these skilled professionals. On the other hand, according to the data this nursing home provided, they do not appear to employ physical therapists. The final item we looked at in this area is the number of patients who eventually returned home from the facility. We found that 5.7 percent of this nursing home's residents returned home as opposed to remaining at the nursing home on a permanent basis.

Turning to the next category, this facility was given a strong nursing grade. We gave it a grade of B+ in that category, finishing off one of our more favorable report cards. We analyzed the levels of nurses at the nursing home, as well as the quantity of time those nurses spent with patients, in calculating our grade in this area. This facility provided 0.3 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Lastly, we also assessed certain nursing quality-based metrics in computing our nursing grades. These include minimizing residents' pressure ulcers and major falls. We look at these metrics as good indicators of the quality of nursing care offered, since better care tends to reduce these problems.