Boundary Waters Care Center is certified as a Medicare and Medicaid facility and has been approved to provide these services since 1967-07-24. Medicare covers short-term skilled nursing care (typically up to 100 days after a qualifying hospital stay). Medicaid covers long-term care for residents who meet financial eligibility requirements. Contact the facility at (218) 365-8705 or your local Medicaid office to verify current eligibility.

Boundary Waters Care Center holds an overall CMS (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services) rating of 5 out of 5 stars. This is made up of three components: Health Inspection (5★), Staffing (5★), and Quality of Resident Care (5★). Our independent composite quality score — which uses the raw underlying CMS numbers to break ties between similarly-rated facilities — is 88.5/100, placing it #774 of 14703 facilities nationally and #20 of 338 in Minnesota. Star ratings are a useful starting point, but the composite score and individual sub-ratings give a more complete picture for families comparing facilities.

Each resident at Boundary Waters Care Center receives a reported average of 4 hours 2 minutes of total nurse staffing per day. This breaks down as: Registered Nurse (RN) coverage — 1 hour 14 minutes; Licensed Practical Nurse (LPN) — 21 minutes; Nurse Aide — 2 hours 28 minutes. On weekends, total nurse staffing is 3 hours 25 minutes per resident per day. The CMS Staffing Rating for this facility is 5 out of 5. The national average for total nursing hours is approximately 3.5 hrs/day. Total nursing staff turnover is 35.5%. Families are encouraged to ask about current staffing schedules during their facility visit.

In the current reporting period, the facility received 1 fine(s) totaling $10,059. No substantiated complaints have been recorded in the available data. In the most recent CMS reporting period, the facility received 1 fine(s) totaling $10,059, and 0 Medicare payment denial(s). Total penalties: 1. The Total Weighted Health Survey Score is 8.0 (lower scores are better). Full inspection history and complaint details are available at medicare.gov/care-compare.

Nationally, Boundary Waters Care Center ranks 774th out of 14,703 facilities (composite score: 88.5/100), placing it in the top 10% nationwide. Within MN, it ranks 20th out of 338 nursing homes. For 2026 staffing: total nurse hours rank #4,588 nationally and RN hours rank #1,031 nationally (#80 in MN). Our composite quality score of 88.5/100 weighs health inspections, quality of resident care, staffing hours, compliance record, and five-year performance trends — giving a more complete picture than CMS star ratings alone, which can place hundreds of facilities in the same 5-star bucket. To browse and compare all nursing homes in Ely, visit: https://nursinghomesnearme.org/minnesota/ely/