The Highlands at Owasso

On top of having a decent overall score, we also would like to point out that this nursing home received favorable government inspections in recent years. We gave them one of our better scores in this category, with a grade of B+. This is a notably better score than the facility's overall score. Our inspection scores are based on several items located in the a nursing home's recent inspection reports. Places that excel in this area have few deficiencies on those reports. Most importantly, these nursing homes should not have any severe deficiencies which are associated with endangerment of patients. Fortunately, although this place had a few minor dings on its government inspection report, it had no severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are labeled as categories G through L. This tells you the inspectors did not consider any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient health or safety. A few minor deficiencies shouldn't stop you from considering a nursing home.

This nursing home's second highest category ended up being its short-term care score, where it was given a grade of B-. In determining our short-term care ratings, we scrutinize a nursing home's levels of skilled nursing, which includes registered nurses, physical therapists occupational therapists and other highly trained professionals. This rating is often a fair assessment of the facility's rehabilitation. Unfortunately, we found that this facility provided fewer physical therapist and registered nurse hours per resident than most other nursing homes. The final metric we assessed in this area is the number of patients who were able to return home from the facility. We found that just 4.9 percent of this nursing home's residents returned home. Unfortunately, this was below the national average.

This facility's next best category was its nursing grade, where it received a grade of B-. In calculating our nursing scores, we weigh both the number of hours nurses spend with residents and the skill levels of the nurses. 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 assessed several nursing quality measures. While this nursing home got docked a bit for its nursing hours per resident, it actually excelled in a few of these quality-based metrics. With fewer than five percent of its patients suffering from pressure ulcers, it fared remarkably well in this subcategory. This is often an indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can typically be avoided by providing better nursing care, such as having a protocol of moving a resident even once per day.

The next area we analyzed was long-term care. In this category, we gave this nursing home a grade of C. Our long-term care ratings are based in part on the nursing home's quantity of nursing care. This means a vast range of personal care services, ranging from assistance with activities of daily living to routine healthcare services. In addition to assessing the quantity of care provided by nurses and other staff, we also looked at the number of residents vaccinated for pneumonia. This nursing home vaccinated 72 percent of its patients. This is quite a bit below average. Nevertheless, this place was able to keep its patients out of the hospital. In fact, it had less than one hospitalization per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is a remarkably low figure.