Food menus are changed 4 times a year and are developed by staff, using the online training modules ECPS,with "input" from the residents at monthly Resident Council meetings.
Special dietary restrictions are respected for those residents requiring them.
Meal quality varies. (Too many ultra processed selections.) Homemade items are best. Staff do their best to ensure meals are served in a timely manner: breakfast - 8:30 AM, main meal - 12:30 PM, supper - 5:30PM, with snacks at 10:30 AM and 7:30 PM.
Order of serving residents is reversed at each meal. With 180 residents who have different tastes and varying levels of dementia it's a challenging environment.One day a resident may enjoy a certain food, the next refuse to eat the same item.
The menu includes choice of 2 dishes or an alternative of sandwiches is always available to the residents. There's no shortage of food (and waste) here.
Residents, those who are able, (remember: over 70% of residents have dementia here) can voice their concerns at monthly Resident Council meetings. ( These meeting are monitored by the Ministry of Health - by reviewing the meeting minutes.)
In our experience: The environment can be quite noisy- ceiling speakers playing music,and the TV on, in addition to all the expected noise of staff serving 30 residents. (Noise at these levels is a recognized negative behaviour stimulus.)
Laundry- Bring enough clothes to fit the season.Storage area is limited, so about 5 or 6 of everything should suffice. Ensure you complete the forms (in lobby) for labelling clothing when bringing clothing for your resident, and keep a copy. (Note to families: take photos of the more expensive pieces in case off loss.) Labelling is completed by the staff quickly and returned to the resident's room. Clothing is laundered every day (except perhaps sleepware, sweaters, etc.) and returned within several days.
One warning: the laundry process can be hard on clothes.If you have expensive sweaters,blouses etc. our experience is it's best to take them home for laundering, or use the machines available on the 7th floor.(Dry cleaning is your responsibility.)
In cases of damaged/lost clothing a reimbursement policy provides for a reasonable refund (and photos you took will simplify matters- you did take photos, right?) It can take months to obtain a refund for lost clothing.
There does seem to be a black market for hair brushes here as evidenced by the disappearing act of so many -we recommend using the inexpensive Residence- supplied brushes.