Prioritize the Vulnerable

The elderly are suffering horrific conditions in skilled nursing facilities and ALFs across the nation. We’ve heard of the staffing shortages but deeper problems remain like the admission process, lack of quality care, and uneducated or underpaid caregivers.

It’s a terrible fate for people with chronic diseases who cannot be cared for at home and we can do better. As a healthcare worker, I’ve seen the failure firsthand of the leadership at these kinds of facilities. I believe we can address a few issues by:

  1. Fund memory care education and make it mandatory for people in this field. These people will be safer if their caregivers, for example, knew that simply placing a cup of water in front of a disoriented patient will not make them drink it. (True story and things like this is a problem).
  2. Invest in nursing leadership. I love nurses I really do but some get placed into management positions sometimes recklessly out of desperation. Make it mandatory for the Director of Nursing to be a Nurse Practitioner or higher with a masters in health administration. Elevate the qualifications such as requirements for further leadership education and certification in specialty areas (geriatric and wound care).
  3. Promote long term health planning among Americans
  4. Make classes mandatory that cover practical health education including explaining health insurance, how to choose it, and how to navigate the system to senior high schoolers.

I hope we can do better for our parents in the near future. If not for them, then for every American who may suffer needlessly at the hands of ill equipped strangers.

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Thanks for speaking up. I wish this issue got more attention.

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Absolutely need to address this issue.