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Avera @ Home

901 S Dakota St, Ste 1A -, Milbank, SD 57252

(605) 432-3259
B

Above average

72 / 100

Ownership
Other
Medicare certified
June 2000
Patients on any given day
5
CCN
431515

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Avera @ Home, ElderGrade B summary card

This is the card people see when this page is shared or linked, built from the same federal figures shown above.

What this costs you

If the patient has Medicare Part A and a doctor certifies a life expectancy of six months or less, the Medicare Hospice Benefit pays this provider directly. The family pays nothing for hospice visits, nursing, medicines related to the terminal illness, or equipment. No hospice may charge you for those and none may ask for a deposit. Medicare paid this provider an average of $7,411 per patient over the measurement period. That is what the federal government spent, not what a family pays, we publish it because it is the number the provider is paid on.

How we graded it

Our method
  • Family caregiver experience

    21.25 / 30

    What bereaved family caregivers said about the hospice afterwards, in the CMS-run CAHPS Hospice Survey.

    • 87% of families would definitely recommend it (national median 86%)
  • Presence at the end

    17.5 / 25

    Whether a nurse or social worker was actually there in the final days, which is the single thing families remember.

    • 69% of patients had a nurse or social worker visit in their last three days (national median 61%)
  • Nursing presence

    13 / 20

    How much registered-nurse time patients get, and how often visits lapse for days at a time.

  • Discharge integrity

    9.75 / 15

    How often patients are signed off hospice alive, the pattern that shows up when a provider enrols people who were never dying, or drops people who become expensive.

  • Care process

    10 / 10

    Whether the basics were done at admission: pain screened, breathlessness treated, treatment preferences and beliefs asked about.

    • 100% of admissions got the full set of screenings (national median 96.5%)

Was anyone there at the end?

Hospice is judged on the last few days more than anything else. These are this provider's numbers against the national average.

Patients visited by a nurse or social worker in their last three days69%
National average 56%Better than average
Patients who had a visit close to death91%
Admissions that got the full set of screenings, pain, breathlessness, treatment wishes, beliefs100%
National average 92%Better than average
Nurse minutes per routine home care day15.1 min
National average 20.1 minBelow average

What bereaved families said

CMS has not published survey results for this hospice. It only reports them once enough family caregivers have completed the questionnaire, so smaller providers often have none. That is a gap in the data, not a mark against the provider, ask them directly whether they run their own bereavement survey and what it showed.

Where they provide care

  • In a nursing facility 49%
  • In an assisted living facility 32%
  • In their own home 19%

Who they care for

Main diagnosis of their patients.

  • Cancer 31%
  • Other conditions 27%
  • Heart and circulatory disease 24%

Questions families ask about Avera @ Home

Does Avera @ Home cost anything?
No. If the patient has Medicare Part A and a doctor certifies a life expectancy of six months or less, the Medicare Hospice Benefit pays Avera @ Home directly for visits, nursing, equipment and medicines related to the terminal illness. The family is not billed for those and no hospice may ask for a deposit.
How often does Avera @ Home visit patients in their final days?
CMS records that 69% of this hospice's patients were visited by a registered nurse or social worker in the last three days of life, against a national average of 56%.
What do families say about Avera @ Home?
In the CMS-run survey of bereaved family caregivers, results were published and 87% of families said they would definitely recommend it. The survey is sent by CMS, not by the hospice, and the hospice cannot choose who is asked.
How is Avera @ Home graded?
ElderGrade grades it B, above average, scoring 72 out of 100 on the federal hospice record: what bereaved families reported, visits in the last days of life, nurse time per home care day, live-discharge patterns and admission screenings. We take no payment from hospices.
Where does Avera @ Home provide care?
Most of this hospice's care is delivered in a nursing facility, 49% of its patients. Hospice is a service rather than a place, so the team travels to wherever the patient is living.

Source: CMS Hospice Provider Data (10/01/2024 - 09/30/2025) and the CAHPS Hospice Survey (10/01/2023-09/30/2025), published by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. ElderGrade takes no payment from hospices, chains or placement agencies, and holds no photographs of this provider. Graded 3 November 2026. How we source our data.