Assisted Living Homes Are Not Nursing Homes
In olden days, the life of seniors was routed only to nursing cares or hospitals. The sexagenarians, diseased and the paralyzed forcefully ended their lives in hospital beds and the atmosphere provided there was not comfortable. But in 1990’s, in order to enable convenient living and define new life for those respected and incapable that marked the social responsibility of the nation, assisted living was initiated. Assisted living portrays a life with the assistance of one or other people like family members, nursing cares etc. Though the concept of nursing homes was old, the assisted living was designed with the same purpose but different objectives.
Assisted living homes were as a result of such implementations. The nursing homes provided medication facilities and doctors were available to treat the diseased, including infectious diseases. But the assisted living homes lack these medical facilities in that they can only provide aid to minor diseases and manage a hospital nearby for further need. However, nursing homes lack the affection and care that we find in the living homes in the communities. The assisted living homes were designed to comfort the diseased. The rooms include a single room, kitchen and a restroom. For people who wish to live independently, the facility of luxurious apartments was also provided. The residents were to select either a community or individual survival. The nursing homes lack privacy and the residents share their rooms. The cost of assisted living homes varied according to the requested services and medication facilities required but are cheaper than the nursing homes.
The recruited staff undergoes certified training prior to the job and is well equipped with the ways to support each of the residents. The staff takes shifts to assist residents and carry out various tasks like laundry, house-keeping, cleaning, cooking meals etc. Also included in the assisted living homes are physiotherapies, exercises, and extra activities to inject energy in the residents. Regular get-togethers for all the residents, both individual and the communal survivors, are also included. And also available are therapy dogs to heal mental illness of the patients and provide friendly environment. In nursing homes, the staff provides 24 hour medical facilities while with the assisted living homes, the medical administration is handled by a third party, which is a bad decision for those sticking to bed. They require skilled nursing for daily care. But sometimes even the nursing homes are under staffed and over-worked, which might sometimes result in avoiding the patients.
Nursing homes are of different types for different diseases for example, Alzheimer’s, mentally ill etc. Assisted living homes are governed by state regulations and these differ from state to state and some of the regulations like whether to admit an Alzheimer patient still need to be formulated. Even the Medicaid provided by the government for low income families is not accepted by the assisted living homes but the nursing homes come under it.
