The Barrington of Carmel

We also wanted to point out that this nursing home has received near flawless health inspections recently. We gave them an impressive grade of A+ in this area. Inspection scores account for several factors found on a nursing home's inspection report. One key criteria we consider is the quantity and severity of deficiencies. Facilities with higher grades in this area typically have few severe deficiencies. Fortunately, although this nursing home had some minor dings on its inspection report, it had no severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are found in categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This means the government inspectors did not consider any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient safety or health. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

We also gave this nursing home a score of A+ for its short-term care grade. In the area of short-term care, we strive to qualify indicators of a nursing home's rehabilitation services. We assess a nursing home's skilled nursing services, such as the ones performed by registered nurses and physical, occupational and other therapists. Fortunately, it looks like this facility has registered nurses on staff. Not all nursing homes employs these skilled professionals. However, according to the data this nursing home provided, it does not look like the facility employs physical therapists. The last datapoint we looked at in this area is the number of residents that who were able to eventually return home from the nursing home. We found that 5.4 percent of this nursing home's patients returned home as opposed to remaining at the nursing home on a permanent basis.

This facility also was dominant in the area of long-term care, where it received a grade of A-. Only a select group of facilities fared better in this area. When facilities receive this type of grade in this category it is typically a good sign for resident care and indicates that the place is well-staffed with nurses aids. In addition to assessing the amount of care provided by nurses aids and other staff, we also looked at the percentage of residents vaccinated for pneumonia. This nursing home provided the vaccine to 100 percent of its patients, which is an impressive figure. Pneumonia tragically can be a dangerous illness for nursing home residents so we like it when a nursing home doesn't roll the dice on this issue. Clearly, this place is doing something right in this area as it was able to keep its patients out of the hospital. Indeed, it had less than one hospitalization per one thousand long-term resident days, which is an impressively low number.

In our last category, we awarded this nursing home a grade of A+ for its nursing grade. This finished off a very favorable report card. Our nursing score is based on the nursing home's nurse staffing levels. We weigh both the levels of training of those nurses as well as the quantity of hours spent with patients. This particular nursing home provided 0.4 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also factored a few quality measures into our nursing grades. This place was relatively weak in two of the major areas we focus on, with below average scores for minimizing its residents' major falls and pressure ulcers. These areas are generally reliable indicators of the quality of nursing care provided.