Looking for a nursing home? Make sure to do your research

The U.S. has more nursing homes then in any other country in the world. Even when they are your loving parents, as soon as they become a bother to you, you get rid of them. You only visit on weekends or less. Heaven forbid they get in the way of your lifestyle. 

Families, when considering putting Mom or Dad into a nursing home figure they are doing them (or themselves) a favor by transferring all their parents assets into their own names. By doing that, they can then get the parent into a nursing home solely on medicaid. That is your first mistake. I was a CNA for several years. The CNA is the person that takes personal care your loved one. I worked for several nursing homes, from medicaid to private pay. Believe me when I tell you, private pay is the way to go. The first difference I noticed, was the ratio between CNA and residents. Private pay was approx. 5-1, medicaid was 10/12+-1. The nursing homes are in the business to make money. Medicaid does not pay well, therefore, expenses have to be kept low. So for medicaid, the nursing homes use the minimum CNA's allowed by law, that the nursing board recommends. Give thought to how you want your loved ones end of life experience to be. I agree with whirledworld's comments. Show up at the nursing home at different times. Check in with your family member often.

I owned an Adult foster care home. I was a rare breed, a white american. My home was a level three, meaning I could care for the residents until death, could do everything a nursing home could do, except vent care and direct IVs. My home was modest, homey and not fancy with only one bathroom. I/we gave outstanding care, we deeply cared for all that came into the home....but my home and care was not the norm out there.

 I then opened a placement agency, to help make finding the right home for the aging parent. I would place those people into AFC, Rehab Centers and so on. What I saw in the field would make your skin crawl. Those grand Romanian homes are sure nice, with all the private bathrooms, potted ferns and baby grand piano. Think twice, although they can speak prefect English but when no one was visiting, Romanian was only spoken, just what an aging person can understand. One home was found spitting in the resident's meals. I saw another elderly demented woman knocked in her bedroom. What mom was paying, had nothing to do with her level of care.

Even checking state records will not tell you if the home provides good care. When the state licensing inspectors come in, they don't even look at the residents, they are only concerned about the paper work. The inspectors will sit for hours, going over progress notes, med sheets, they check the smoke detectors and leave. The only time they will interview a resident is if there has been a formal complaint made. 

There is so much paperwork, the licence of the company is on the line for it. In a nursing home, there is one cna per 20 residents. That cna is responsible for bathing, dressing, toileting those 20 people, and that employee MUST do all his/her paperwork. Paperwork is more important than taking Grandpa to the bathroom. NO overtime is permitted, duties must be done by the end of his/her shift....guess who is going to suffer if paperwork needs to be finished

Money does not play a huge roll in most of these settings. In an Adult Care Home, it doesn't matter is mom is paying 5 grand a mouth or on medicaid, the level of care is the same. In a nursing or rehab center, the can's don't know who is paying what. 

Regarding the tool that KATU is spotlighting, it really isn't that useful...the reason why, if a med is not signed off on, that is an offence and noted in the file. If the rehab, AFC or Assisted Living forget to check the expiration date on the fire extinguisher, that is considered a huge offence and fines could be issued. These offenses have nothing to do with the level of care an elder is receiving. 

Selecting the right living environment for an aging love one is not an easy task. Placement agencies can be an excellent source. The fee is not paid by the family but by the facility. A good placement agencies reads the state records, interviews the facility, will talk with residents and will work hand in hand with the family to make a positive choice. But no one is prefect, even agencies can be broadsided.

Best word of advice, trust your gut....no matter how great anything may appear, if your get a strange feeling, kept on looking.

How come the one on 86 and Powell and the other one at east moreland are not listed??

The quality of care is directly related to how much money you are willing to spend.  For the most part, nursing homes are nothing more than human warehouses, where the 'residents' are ignored.  Do your research.

Does ProPublica receive any sort of financial gain from Nursing homes?  Can the "A" grade be bought?  I admit, some places are just bad...and the Administration will ALWAYS go on about their "high quality & standards".  They're not going to be honest or transparent; that doesn't keep their beds filled.

This is why I take care of my Dad at our home. I know not everyone can do it, or should even, but I made the choice to take care of him to the best of my ability until I am unable to. I quit my job to do so 5 years ago and, while it's difficult and we are very low income, I know that he gets at least 3 healthy meals a day, lives in a clean environment, takes his medications on time, and see his doctors regularly. He also gets out for fresh air and light exercise and also socialization.. Luckily, he is not at the stage yet for actual nursing/medical care. When that time comes I am not sure what my plans are. I may need to get special training to take care of him rather than find him a care home home as, to be honest, I have yet to see one nursing home that doesn't freak me out. With my Mom deceased, I am all he has left and I can't have him somewhere where he will be mistreated, starved, or harmed.

Be afraid.....be very afraid. And be a fine-tooth comb. And TOTALLY SKEPTICAL at what you are told by the facilities. Trust your eyes and you nose and your guts.  And  for heaven' sake don't be poor  and end up in a really low-dive facility or you may as well get your affairs in order early.

What I have seen of  abysmal nursing home and adult care facilities makes me think this is half the reason people are afraid to get old and  also why some people want to opt for assisted suicide.   While assisted suicide may well have it's place in various conditions, the fact is there has never been enough emphasis on palliative care as far as I can see by the experiences I had with elderly parents in local nursing homes. What I have seen left me with nightmares. Two  facilities that my dad was in with supposed decent reviews were really, really inadequate bare-bones...like paying to rent a bed in a room for him and low-level institutional food. We soon learned no matter how many times we talked with staff that he simply would starve if one of us didn't show up at meal times to feed him as he could not hold silverware and aim it at his mouth any longer. I caught the staff more than once rolling an untouched meal out of his room cheerfully saying "He's done eating! Guess he wasn't very hungry!". Then they would go sit down and drink Cokes and keep socializing. Anything halfway decent/new in his wardrobe/room immediately went missing, including socks, blankets, even my hat  that I had forgotten one evening. 

At another one, the nurses and CNAs spent more time playing with their  own pet  miniature poodle dogs they brought to work  than toileting desperate patients who were lucid and begging, but made to wait 20 minutes or more and then soil themselves and sit in shame and despair. It horrified me. If a family complained at all, their loved one would be mistreated later sometimes.

One  facility my mom was in had a big brute of a staffer  (who obviously hated his job but as an immigrant may not have been able to get another job )  threaten to tie her to the commode all night with a lifting belt if she asked  for help to get up to use the commode one more time (she could not get up alone and had a urinary tract infection at the time).  My mother, a long time strong survivor type of person  whom I had rarely ever seen cry was in tears and shaking in fear when she told me this the next day. I spoke to the head nurse  ( a 26 yr old RN) who confided that she  herself was trying to get another job as this kind of thing happened all the time  at this facility and worse and she feared for her license by staying there. My sibs and I finally got my mom into what was supposed to be a premier facility even though it was a long drive across town, and while it was better, nevertheless there were  troubling issues with feeding (again, like with my dad) and dietary concerns, her wedding/engagement ring was  cut/stolen, strange drug addicts came dressed as outside health care visitors though the facility and ripped fentanyl patches off of other patients across the hall from her. Dead people in body bags were rolled out through the main hallway in front of the patients' open room doors sometimes. Lots of attention, time, regular meetings w/ staff,  surprise spot-checks by my family are what were needed to keep my mother's level of care good at this facility. 

A facility my brother had inquired about for our mother was discovered to have  had staff drop a patient to the floor when lifting her on the bed and  her hip was thereby fractured... then  the staff covered up the incident by putting her back in bed and  they left here there with no report of what happened or calling 911 to get  medical treatment  for her to suffer an agonizing 4 days before she was brought to an ER  as she was dying from her injury. And she did die.

 Let the buyer beware and don't abandon your loved one there: keep an eye on them and vary your schedule. Show up when meal times are close to ending or at the beginning at watch if your loved one can even feed themselves because the staff will never tell you. Show up at bed time, shower-time, physical therapy time, medication time. Be prepared to make it a part-time second job, more or less, while it lasts and chalk it up to  labor of love and the karma bank.

I noticed quite a few Avamere facilities on the map. When I went to the ProPublica site, I failed to find any information on the Avamere @ Bethany. In fact, there seems to be a "hole" in the map north of 26 and west of Portland. Any clue as to why? There are quite a few facilities in that area. 

At the one by Reynolds High School, we had to ring the buzzer and wait for over half an hour for somebody to come open it, while the delivery guy was waiting there with us. Said it was typical.

I had to pour water into my grandfmother's oxygen machine because the staff member didn't know how to do it. I didn't either, but, I went to the store, got some distilled water and figured it out. So many things in such a short time, I don't even want to talk about it anymore.

Do your research and don't be fooled by a fancy foyer and a pretty lobby.

The cost of going to a nursing home, if you are on medicare,  is very expensive and without supplemental coverage, it is not within the reach of most people.   After twenty days, without supplemental coverage, it can cost well over $100.00 per day out of your pocket.  Even with the extra coverage, after 100 days, it will then cost you over $100.00 per day.  Not sure what obamacare is going to do with this situation, but, it won't be any cheaper than it is now.  I have found, from personal experience, that both nursing homes and assisted living homes are much more expensive in the Portland area than they are in several other locations.   A few years ago, the cost of my mother being in one in the Vancouver Portland area was over $2000.00 per month.  In Pocatello, Idaho, the same type of facility was under $800.00 per month.  It definitely pays to shop around.

More like good luck.............. AFFORDING ONE!!!!!

One thing I know about putting parents in a nursing home. Please make sure you check on them all the time. I know from experience. Don't just leave them there.