Choosing a Nursing Home

01 May Choosing a Nursing Home

If you need to stay at a nursing home for your own care or you need to bring a relative to a nursing home, you're facing one of the most important decisions of your life. If you choose the right nursing home, you can rest assured that the patient will enjoy excellent care, plenty of social activities and a generally good quality of life. If you choose the wrong nursing home, you may end up putting your loved one in a situation where they are victimized, abused and, in the worst-case scenario, where they may even end up losing their life due to the negligence of the nursing home operators.

When you are taking a look at nursing homes, be sure you sit down and ask good questions about the level of care, the quality of the staff and the competence of the administration at the facility that you're considering. Here are some sample questions that you may want to ask:

• How fast can emergency medical care be delivered
• Have you ever been sued for negligence?
• How many patients are there per staff member?
• What is the most common level of education that the healthcare staff possesses?
• Have you ever been cited for inadequate or dirty facilities?
• How much socialization do the patients get
• What kind of activities do you provide for patients?
• If I have a problem, what does the complaint process involve and to whom do I complain?

Asking such questions can provide you with good information about the overall quality of the establishment. If the establishment is run by qualified and concerned individuals, they will be more than happy to answer any questions you have and, in fact, they may actually appreciate the fact that you care enough about your loved one to ask such questions.

Sending someone to a nursing home is never an easy decision. It's even harder when you don't have a good idea of the overall quality of the establishment. Take the time to sit down with the staff at the establishment and to ask them hard questions about how they treat their patients and about the working environment. You will likely find that the establishments that take the most time to answer your questions and that are very engaged with you are also the ones that provide the highest levels of care. If your loved one does become the victim of nursing home mistreatment, contact a lawyer for nursing home abuse.