The Cambridge House

Although we gave this facility an abysmal overall grade, we gave it a grade of B- for our nursing category. Our nursing grade weighs many components, however, the paramount consideration is the level of nurse hours per patient per week. This facility provided just 0.3 hours of nursing care per resident per day. This is a relatively low total compared to most other facilities. Lastly, we also looked at some nursing quality-based metrics. While this place got dinged a bit for its nursing hours, it actually excelled in some of these quality measures. With less than five percent of its patients experiencing pressure ulcers, it did remarkably well in this statistic. This is generally an indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can typically be avoided by offering better nursing care, such as by employing a protocol of turning patients even once per day.

Unfortunately, this facility only received a grade of D for its long-term care score, which turns out to be one of its more favorable category scores. For residents looking for a permanent residence rather than skilled nursing, long-term care is an important category. After we finished looking at the quantity of care provided by nurses, we then looked at the facility's vaccination data. We were pleased to find that this nursing home vaccinates 97 percent of its patients for pneumonia. Surprisingly, this nursing home was able to keep its patients out of the hospital. Indeed, it had only 0.01 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days. Sadly, a few of its other scores in this category were not as favorable as these.

This facility received very poor government inspection reports in recent years, causing us to give them a lowly F in our inspection category. An F in this area is typically a sign that there were some red flags on the nursing home's inspections. For places with bad inspection scores, you should really focus on any severe deficiencies found on their recent inspection reports. This nursing home was hit with 4 deficiencies by CMS. The only positive thing we found is that none of its deficiencies were in the categories that suggest that they posed a risk to resident safety or health. Lastly, this facility was flagged by CMS for possible abuse or neglect. We prefer to avoid facilities with this designation. Please do your best to find an alternative nursing home.

The last area we graded was short-term care. This nursing home received a rock bottom grade of F in this area. In determining our short-term care scores, we look at the facility's skilled nursing services, including those performed by registered nurses, respiratory therapists, physical therapists and other types of skilled professionals. Our goal is to formulate a scale for comparing the rehabilitation services of various nursing homes. As you might expect, we learned that this facility offers substantially less registered nurse and physical therapist hours per patient than the typical facility. Lastly, we looked at the number of residents who eventually returned home from this nursing home. This nursing home didn't fare well here either. In fact, we found that just 4.4 percent of this facility's patients were able to return home.