I've been reflecting on this review since I first moved my elderly parents into this facility a…read moreyear and a half ago. I hesitated to write a review earlier, because I did not know if it would affect their care. Sadly they have now both passed.
If I could have offered this feedback directly and felt that it would be heard, I would have done that. But my strong impression dealing with the management here is that they are not interested in feedback and do not view it as a way of learning or improving as a business, but rather as a waste of time and a source of resentment. So I just want to make sure others have an informed understanding of what they are getting themselves into here. The kind of review that I wish I had had myself when I first uprooted my parents, both of them with advanced Parkinson's Disease, and moved them across the country from Pennsylvania to live here.
Highlights:
- The facility is very beautiful. That was what I was sold on originally.
- The sales team is kind and good at their job. I feel that they did their best to lean in and smooth the way for my parents and for me, even though when it came to actual management of the residence, that went beyond their scope.
- There are many individual nurses and caregivers who are very caring and good at their jobs.
- Overall I believe that the facility is mismanaged. The leadership of the center is inaccessible. They do not come to work. They do not pick up their phones. They do not respond to emails. There are no company email lists that allow you to get greater visibility for your communication so that someone higher up will hold the facility accountable to respond--your email goes into an individual email inbox where it is largely ignored.
- The nurses and caregivers are not actively managed. No one helps them organize themselves or facilitates communication. No one is present to see first hand when they are over-stretched and cannot handle all of the individual needs on their floor. This results in some pretty serious mismanagement of medication. One time I discovered purely by accident, because I happened to visit, that my father had not received his Parkinson's medication for 3 days, because they had not re-ordered it from the pharmacy or had some type of snag. And they did not call me or make sure that it was resolved. They just let the medication lapse.
- Once I saw that was happening, I went far, far, far out of my way to create written medication schedules to try to ensure medication was administered correctly. Multiple times my father himself caught incorrect medication, even though he was barely in a cognitive state to be able to do that and it was very unfair for him to have to be concerned with it. Again, I do not attribute this to the nurses. They are good, well meaning people who want to do their jobs. I attribute it to management that does not put in place systems for them or help organize things or ensure good communication. They just are sort of left there to function as best as they can without leadership.
- Most of the nurses / caregivers they hire are good, but some are NOT good. Early on, there was a nurse on the team who got into a very adversarial relationship with my mother, trying to force her to go to bed or to get up or something that she did not want to do. When I came to visit after a week trip I found her in a paranoid, delusional state, convinced that someone was trying to hurt her. Of course she was very sick and it was basically a delusion. But when I interacted with that nurse myself, I understood why she felt that way. He was aggressive and controlling. They did promise to fire that nurse. But then on a future occasion I came back and found him there. I had to complain again.
- Memory care is a bit better. But primarily it is better because once someone is on hospice, they have access to a separate hospice provider who comes INTO the facility to provide care. And that hospice provider is excellent, top to bottom. I cannot possibly say enough good things about them. But they are not employed or managed by the center. They just come in on a daily basis to provide care.
- In the last month of my father's life, he developed very severe delusions arising out of Parkinson's related dementia, and became aggressive. It was very sad and very hard to watch. My father was a mild-mannered mathematician all his life. It simply was not him or his character to behave in the way he did.
- I was so upset by the way the facility handled this. They called the police on him. I had to drop everything and rush over to keep them from escalating past a point of no return. When I went up to the apartment, Brenda, the leader in charge of AL, was smirking and laughing at him and his delusions. It turned my stomach. It still keeps me up at night.
If you have your parents or loved ones here, please be prepared to work directly with the staff yourself to ensure communication & good care. It requires constant vigilance.
