West Memphis Health and Rehab

To pair with its relatively modest overall score, we awarded this facility an A- for its inspection grade. This is far better than its overall rating. Inspection grades are based on several datapoints found on the a nursing home's recent inspection reports. Places that excel in this area tend to have few deficiencies on their reports. Most importantly, these places should not have any severe deficiencies which are associated with risks to patient safety. Fortunately, although this nursing home had some minor dings on its report, it had zero severe deficiencies. Severe deficiencies are those found in categories G, H, I, J, K and L. This tells you the government inspectors didn't deem any of the deficiencies on this facility's report to pose an imminent threat to patient safety or health. A couple of minor deficiencies shouldn't lead you to cross a nursing home off your list.

In addition, we awarded this nursing home a grade of B+ in our nursing category. This is one of our better grades. Nursing ratings are mostly based on a nursing home's nurse staffing. This nursing home provides 0.3 hours of nursing care per resident per day. Finally, we also assessed several nursing quality-based metrics and this nursing home excelled in some of these areas. With less than five percent of its residents sustaining pressure ulcers, it performed as well as any facility Arkansas in this category. This is generally a good indicator of quality nursing care. Pressure ulcers can typically be prevented by providing better nursing care, such as by employing a policy of moving residents even once per day.

The next area we analyzed is short-term care. In that category, we awarded this facility a grade of C. In determining our short-term care scores, we look at a facility's levels of skilled nursing services, which includes registered nurses, physical therapists respiratory therapists and other highly skilled individuals. This grade is frequently a solid assessment of the nursing home's rehabilitation services. Unfortunately, we found that this facility provided fewer physical therapist and registered nurse hours per resident than most other nursing homes. The final item we assessed in this area is the percentage of residents who were able to leave the nursing home and return to the community. We discovered that just 2 percent of this facility's patients were able to return home, which is actually below average.

Switching gears to our last area, we gave this facility a grade of D in our long-term care category. This is the facility's least impressive category grade. For residents seeking a permanent place to live as opposed to rehabilitation, long-term care grades are a key measure. Once we assessed the amount of care provided by nurses and other staff, we next considered the facility's vaccination records. This facility vaccinated 100 percent of its patients for pneumonia, which is more than the vast majority of nursing homes. To our surprise, this facility was able to keep its patients out of the hospital. In fact, it had only 0.01 hospitalizations per 1,000 long-term resident days. Unfortunately, some of its other scores in this category were not as favorable as these.