Nursing homes used to be dark and dreary places because nobody knew what to do or how to serve seniors. Today, there’s not only a science dedicated to elder health, but there’s a process in place to provide the best kind of care. Yet for some reason, the only stories that make headlines are those that prey on mass hysteria. In other words, stories that cry out injustice.
There are still oversights among the millions of elder care homes in the world. There are still outliers who bypass the system of background checks and drug tests due to a clerical error. But that’s not how it is on a daily basis.
In popular media and news outlets, nursing homes are represented as dreary places where elders are neglected and live out their days in a home that’s more akin to a prison. This just isn’t true and especially given how they use the term “nursing homes.”
1. Nursing Homes are not Long-Term
For reference, nursing homes are temporary recovery clinics. They are the layovers for seniors coming out of the hospital and in need of more care before they can go home. The cost of hospitals is too great, so these skilled nursing facilities act as the next best thing. They provide rehabilitation and therapeutic services to help seniors get back on their feet and out the door.
This way, hospitals can continue to serve the truly dire patients and nursing homes can act as a reprieve from the sterile medical buildings.
2. Nursing Homes are not like Hospitals
Unlike the smell of hand sanitizer and the sound of squeaky clean floors. Nursing homes are very homey, personable, and even allow elders to bring personal possessions. They believe this motivates elders to recovery if they’re surrounded in a positive environment.
Moreover, the food is hardly like the food you’d find at a hospital. Many have gourmand chefs catering to everyone’s dietary restrictions while still providing a new flavor to their meals every day.
3. Nursing Homes do not keep Seniors Drugged
There’s a common misconception that nursing homes are akin to One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, where the nurses regularly keep the patients sedated or medicated to prevent them from voicing their thoughts or opinions.
Not even memory care facilities do this. If drugs are provided, they’re prescribed long in advance from their primary care doctors. If pain killers are needed, they are applied, but not if it’ll prevent recovery. The goal of the staff members is to get the seniors back on their feet and out the door—not keep them locked up.
4. Nursing Homes have Happy Residents
Most residents are happy at the nursing homes. The staff members are there to boost the elders’ self-esteem; to help push them to go the extra mile. It’s a positive environment that’s built on trust, devotion, and faith.
These are not negatives. Nursing homes may have been synonymous with dreary living at one point in time, but if every nursing home was the way they are depicted in the media then they wouldn’t exist at all. Think about it. If nursing homes were so bad, then why wouldn’t the next generation abolish them?
One of the most common responses to senior housing our advisors hear is, “Why didn’t I do this sooner” and it’s always because they imagined retirement housing as some cursed atrocity. But if you want a joyous and liberating retirement, then senior housing is the way to go. And if you’re in the hospital racking up exorbitant fees, you’ll want to transfer to a skilled nursing home to recover.
If you need help finding the right housing solution, just contact the advisors. They can provide information on all the local communities in the Pacific Northwest, be it assisted living in Portland or nursing homes in SeaTac.