The Lighthouse

To go along with its strong overall grade, we awarded this nursing home a grade of A+ for our inspections rating. We weigh several aspects of a nursing home's inspection report in computing these inspection grades. One of those factors is deficiencies. It should be noted that the severity of these deficiencies is arguably more meaningful than the number of deficiencies, as some of these can be quite minor. This nursing home was hit with 3 deficiencies on its inspection report, but we were relieved to see that none were considered to be severe. This indicates that the inspectors didn't deem any of these deficiencies an immediate threat to patient safety or health. Finally, this facility had no substantiated complaints this year from residents, which is an excellent sign.

An additional reason we assessed this nursing home so highly is that it was awarded an A+ long-term care grade. This is flat out as strong as it gets in this category. Long-term care ratings of this caliber generally require both around the clock care from nurses and aids, as well as quality routine healthcare services. Once we concluded our assessment of the amount of care provided by nurses, we then analyzed the facility's vaccination statistics. This facility vaccinated 100 percent of its residents against pneumonia, which is what we like to see. Pneumonia is often a deadly ailment for nursing home patients so we like it when a nursing home does not take any chances. Finally, this nursing home was able to limit hospitalizations. It had only 0.01 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days, which is an impressively low figure.

This first-rate facility also excelled in the area of nursing, where it received a grade of A+. Few nursing homes performed better in this area. We looked at the licensure of nurses working for the facility, as well as the quantity of time the nurses spent with patients, in calculating our grade in this area. This nursing home averages 0.5 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also assessed several nursing quality-based metrics and this facility excelled in some of these areas. With less than five percent of its residents sustaining pressure ulcers, it performed as well as any nursing home the country in this category. This is generally a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can frequently be prevented by providing better nursing care, such as employing a system of turning a patient more frequently.

Moving on to the next area, this nursing home also excelled in our short-term care category. We awarded it a grade of B+ in that area. This completed a very impressive profile. In calculating these short-term care ratings, we analyze the nursing home's skilled nursing services, such as those performed by registered nurses, speech therapists, physical therapists and other types of therapists. The purpose is to formulate a barometer for sizing up the rehabilitation services of different nursing homes. Fortunately, it looks like this facility has registered nurses on staff. Not all facilities employs these types of nurses. However, based on the information this nursing home provided, it does not look like the facility employs physical therapists. The final statistic we assessed in this area is the number of residents that ultimately were able to return home from the facility. We found that 4.3 percent of this nursing home's patients returned home as opposed to remaining at the facility on a permanent basis.