Prairie Lakes Home Health
401 9th Ave NW Post Office Box 1210, Watertown, SD 57201 · Medicare-certified home health agency
📞 Call this agency — (605) 882-7745
This star is built from outcome measures across the agency’s recent Medicare patients and lags real conditions by a year or more. CMS does not publish the patient count behind it here, so a small agency’s star can rest on a thin sample. Treat it as one signal, not a verdict — the measure-by-measure record is on Care Compare below.
69.14% of this agency’s patients got better at taking their medicines correctly by mouth across about 359 recent Medicare patients, against 88.07% nationally. Medicare rates it worse than national rate for patients who went back to living in the community after their care. 85% of the 209 families surveyed said they would definitely recommend it.
How this agency’s patients did
| Measure | This agency | National | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Started care in a timely manner 633 patients | 100% | 96.51% | about the same |
| Got better at walking or moving around 408 patients | 78.42% | 88.6% | worse |
| Got better at getting in and out of bed 410 patients | 89.28% | 89.71% | about the same |
| Got better at bathing 411 patients | 79.47% | 90.63% | worse |
| Breathing improved 371 patients | 73.76% | 91.31% | worse |
| Got better at taking their medicines correctly by mouth 359 patients | 69.14% | 88.07% | worse |
| Medication problems acted on promptly by a doctor 633 patients | 96.37% | 94.45% | about the same |
| Discharge function score 410 patients | 83.66% | 71.74% | better |
| Checked whether the patient had a flu shot 388 patients | 74.74% | 64.24% | better |
| Developed or worsened a pressure sore 426 patients | 0.61% | 0.23% | too few patients to compare |
| Had a fall causing major injury 631 patients | 0.95% | 0.93% | about the same |
These come from the OASIS assessments the agency itself submits to Medicare, so they are self-reported and lag by a year or more. “Better” and “worse” here mean this provider differs from the national figure by more than 10% of it and by more than half a percentage point; anything closer reads “about the same”. That second test matters on the rare-event rows — a national rate of 0.2% would otherwise make almost any provider look remarkable. CMS does not publish a significance test for these measures, so where fewer than 100 patients sit behind a rate — or where the national rate is low enough that a handful of events would swing it — we print both numbers and decline to grade, rather than call a named provider worse than average on the strength of three patients.
Hospital stays and getting home
| Measure | This agency | National | Medicare’s call |
|---|---|---|---|
| Patients who went back to living in the community after their care Higher is better. 404 patients | 68.7% | 77.71% | Worse Than National Rate |
| Patients readmitted to a hospital when it might have been prevented Lower is better. 219 patients | 3.94% | 4.12% | Same As National Rate |
| Patients admitted to a hospital when it might have been prevented Lower is better. 218 patients | 11.24% | 10.83% | Same As National Rate |
These three are risk-adjusted by CMS for how sick each agency’s patients were, which the table above is not — so they are the fairer comparison between agencies serving different populations. The verdict in the last column is Medicare’s own, published with the rate; we have not recalculated it.
What patients said (HHCAHPS survey)
| Measure | Percent of patients | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Team gave care in a professional way | 90% | ||
| Team communicated well | 88% | ||
| Team discussed medicines, pain and home safety | 90% | ||
| Rated the agency 9 or 10 out of 10 | 88% | ||
| Would definitely recommend the agency | 85% |
Based on 209 completed surveys, a 41% response rate. A low response rate means the families who answered may not represent everyone the agency served.
About this agency
Ownership: Non-Profit
Medicare-certified since: 07/31/1984
Services offered: Skilled nursing, Physical therapy, Occupational therapy, Speech therapy, Medical social services, Home health aide
Medicare spending per episode of care: 0.99× the national figure — about the national average. This measures cost, not quality.
Other Medicare-certified agencies in South Dakota
- Avera @ Home Aberdeen, SD 5 of 5
- Good Samaritan Soc-Home Health Of The Black Hills Rapid City, SD 5 of 5
- Signal Health Group West River Rapid City, SD
- Heartland Home Health LLC Belle Fourche, SD 5 of 5
- Monument Health Home Plus Home Health Rapid City, SD 5 of 5
- Monument Health Home Plus Home Health Spearfish, SD 5 of 5
- Sanford Home Health Sioux Falls, SD 4.5 of 5
- State Home Care Services, INC Rapid City, SD 4.5 of 5
Families are usually choosing between several agencies, not evaluating one. Each link opens the same record for that agency. See all agencies in South Dakota.
What this rating measures
Medicare rates home-health agencies on a quality of patient care star — based on how much patients improve (walking, getting in and out of bed, managing medications) and how often care follows recommended practices. See our guides on home care vs. assisted living and the Medicare post-hospital benefit.
Full quality record
The complete, current CMS record for this provider — every quality measure and patient-experience result — lives on Medicare’s official Care Compare tool. We link straight to it rather than repackaging a stale copy.
Certification, contact details, and star rating from the CMS Care Compare dataset (public domain), retrieved 2026-07-17. Quality measures from the CMS home health public reporting file, July 2026 release. Care Compare is the authoritative source for the full quality record and for the provider’s current phone number.