A) There's a constant stream of new faces here who are responsible for taking care of our families. It's the most frequent and ongoing complaint by both residents and families. These faces don't know the residents, the environment, and this puts the residents safety at risk -needlessly.
Given the obvious need to achieve consistency in staffing in an environment of a 70%+ dementia population why does this situation persist?
Ans: The situation was improving after continued questions to management to explain the inconsistent staffing approach to caring for residents, but it appears we've slipped back to the same issue- scheduling seems to be the real challege here...
B) I made a change to my relative's care plan, but the staff were not notified. How does this happen?
Ans: PSW's for example, are to be notified, verbally, by the nurse of all changes in the care plan. This is to be done within 48 hours of the change. It may have been posted in writing in the resident's room but if you don't read the care plans...
C) We've asked on numerous occasions for info on shift schedules e.g. who is going to be on an upcoming shift. The staff are reluctant to provide this. Why?
Ans: We have no idea why this is such a secret. Shift schedules can be arranged up to a year in advance and are posted in the nurse's office. It is your right to have this information.
D) There is a form on the nurse's office window to indicate those staff working the current shift. I've noticed these are completed religiously in other residences. Why not here?
Ans: Some nurses do complete these religiously. (It only takes a minute.) Others don't. Also the casuals/part-timers often don't. Completing these schedules is becoming increasingly critical as some nurses don't know which PSW is caring for which resident
(despite it being the nurse's responsibility to assign). There is significant confusion,evident from the statement of one nurse recently claiming she couldn't be expected to remember which residents PSW's were assigned to. (Another training issue?)
E) How do staff read the resident's care plans if they can not read or write English? How do they read special instructions posted in the rooms?
Ans: Perhaps some don't.
F) We've asked repeatedly for larger fonts on the staff's ID cards, yet still no results. We can't see their names and this is frustrating. Who can help us get this corrected?
Ans: This has been requested numerous times for at least years. Residents and families have requested this. Many excuses,no results.
G) The staff are still using the "shave the skin off your face" shavers despite requests to discontinue this torture.Families are being told residents are resisting being shaved. I wonder why? Who can stop this sadistic practice?
Ans: Management was informed of this last summer(2018) and directed to discontinue using these shavers. Staff are merely using what management is providing them. Pity all those residents who have no family watching out (the majority?).If you have family here, purchase an electric shaver or the 2 blade manual shavers ($1.25/5- at the Dollar stores).
H) The evening shift on our floor is very confused as to which PSW is caring for which resident. In the spring there was a new system to assign a PSW to a resident on a weekly cycle. In mid-summer, unannounced, it changed to a monthly cycle, now, in September, we're back to a weekly. No notice to the families about this.Is anyone in control here? This management makes it very difficult to determine who is caring for our loved ones, in violation of the Residents' Rights.
Ans: When the staff and management can't provide coherent timely information we should all be very concerned. This is sounding like a broken record but MOH needs to be called in to inspect.