Do You Know Where Your Parents Are?
An Insider's Guide To Choices and Options In Senior Health Care
by
Book Cover & Preview Text
Step Two: Assessing an
Institution Prior to or in Lieu of an On-site Visit. (by
phone or on-line)
1. Is the facility owned by a non-profit organization?
When possible, I recommend
non-profit facilities because, traditionally and in my own experience, non-profit
organizations provide the best care. For
example, in a 1999 study of nursing homes in
Non-profit facilities may be sponsored by a private source or a religious, charitable, or fraternal organization. Corporations owning facilities range single institution to regional and national chains. Statistically, facilities owned by for-profit concerns receive the majority of citations for abuse, neglect, and exploitation of residents and for non-compliance with state regulations.
To determine if a facility is owned by a non-profit or for-profit individual or organization, you can contact American Health Care Association (AHCA) at 202-842-4444; 202-842-3860.
2. Does the facility have a satisfactory ranking in each category of
the state survey?
Every facility is subject to a survey by the state to assess if that institution meets the state's basic requirements for the delivery of health care. A report of the results, the annual or biannual survey, must be posted prominently in the public lobby of the facility. Although it is not possible to secure a copy of the posted report without visiting the institution, the survey results and the facility's ranking can be obtained by calling AHCA or your local ombudsman.
If a facility has been cited by the state health care regulators for any violations including abuse, neglect, exploitation and/or any other non-compliance of required medical standards, these violations will be listed here. Facilities are rated in five categories listed in the survey as follows:
Administration
Quality of Care
Resident Rights
Food Service
Environment
The following rating system is applied to each category accompanied by a list of violations, if any, which need to be corrected:
- In Compliance...No deficiencies exist.
- Substantial Compliance – has approved waivers or has minimal deficiencies that are unlikely to cause harm to the resident.
- Corrections Needed - has deficiencies that have the potential to cause harm or compromise the resident’s ability to maintain or improve health status.
- Significant Corrections List – Facility has deficiencies that have caused actual harm or compromised the resident’s ability to maintain or improve health status.
- Immediate Jeopardy – Facility has deficiencies that have caused or are likely to cause serious harm, injury, impairment, or death if not immediately rectified.
Although you may feel the Quality of Care category should be the logical focus of your family's scrutiny, it is important that a facility also has an adequate ranking in the Administration Category. Administrators hire the staff, oversee the training of the staff, and are responsible for the quality of the staff's health care delivery; oversee record-keeping; guarantee legal compliance with state and federal laws; supervise maintenance of the facilities; and oversee continuing certification of the facility. This is a critical issue today when health care facilities are facing staff shortages and thus making compromises.
Naturally, your family will want
to place your loved one in a facility that indicates “compliance” in each category. Only seven out of 700 institutions in
Severe violations are indicated with the phrase "Substandard Quality of Care" with a category's ranking, alerting the reader, in the wording of the state's health care law, to deficiencies identified in critical care and service areas that are provided by the nursing home.
To acquire the survey results,
violations, you can contact the American Health Care Association (AHCA) in
Formats
Book Details
About the Book
Finally a guide to senior health care that is readable, comprehensive, user-friendly, authoritative, and current. In its content, format, and timeliness, Do You Know Where Your Parents Are? surpasses anything else on the market and fills a void. For the first time a true insider, a health care facility administrator, offers distressed families who have read the headlines about institutional abuse and neglect, the crucial information they need to choose the best health care option for a loved one. In clear, no-nonsense prose with the use of easy-to-use removable checklists, JoAnn Westbrook draws from ten years experience to take a family step by step through the maze of modern health care options from aging in place at home to dementia care facilities. With 77 million Baby Boomers who have aging parents and are on the way to retirement themselves, the time for this unique guide is now.
To demonstrate how to interpret one of the most important tools for assessing a facility--the complicated state survey rating system. Ms. Westbrook has included a chapter on how to decipher a state survey. This has become especially relevant since for the first time, the federal government began publishing the survey results in the press--but not an explanation of how to interpret the results.
Having worked as an administrator in Assisted Living, Nursing Home, and Specialty Care facilities, she has first-hand knowledge of the key criteria for measuring the quality of a health care facility as well as the crucial indicators that a facility is substandard or declining in quality. She also brings an insider's experience of negotiating the bureaucratic health care maze from her tenure as a state regional director for a large health care conglomerate. While her sections on health care facilities evolved from her experience as an administrator, the sections on aging in place at home are based, in part, on her experience assisting both her parents to age in place at home. Distressed by the confusing and complicated state of American senior health care and the "bottom line" decisions and corruption which can place a facility and thus a loved one at risk, Westbrook is anxious to share her insider's know-how with a broad audience.
About the Author
My journey into Health Care began when my mother was diagnosed with Bone Cancer and my family and I were compelled to work our way through a maze of health care dilemmas.
I was in college at the time and the gravity of my reality at home pulled me toward a degree in Gerontology. After graduation I became a Licensed Nursing Home Administrator, working in Nursing Homes, Assisted Living, Specialty Care for Dementia, Continuing Care Retirement Communities and Independent campuses. I have designed and developed a Special Care Unit within a Nursing Home; for which I wrote the programs, policies and procedures to meet the state guidelines, and have acted as a designated trainer for teaching Administrators nationwide for a large corporate entity.
It has been my experience not only as an Administrator but also as an Elder Advocate to see how challenging it is to the general public to know what questions to ask and where to go for answers.