Is it easier to simply believe — versus know — your aging loved-one is getting the support and care they deserve? So see them happy, like the pictures in the senior care community brochure? To remember the model apartment and how clean it was and how genuine and informative the tour director was? To check in on them once in a blue moon and find that may today, just today, was a bad day for them?
Sometimes it may be easier to put our heads in the sand. It would be too emotionally hard to believe that things weren’t as they seemed when you placed your loved-one in the facility. What would you do if you learned otherwise? Where would you put them? How would you afford it? How would you get them moved? Would it be any better anyway?
Too many people are caught in this trap — to know, or not to know. To hope and believe? To trust? The statistics say your gut is right. In senior care communities, more than 50% of caregivers admit to abusing seniors. And, 95% of seniors say that they have been abused or that they have seen another abused.
There are many problems with the senior care industry: explosive growth, employee shortages, lack of training and education, poor oversight, weak management, and caregiver burnout. Caregiving is not an easy profession. And, by the way, there are some wonderful, caring, professional senior care communities and caregivers in the system! We should not overlook them.
“Transparency is the key to improving the lives of seniors,” says Rhonda Harper, Founder & CEO of Penrose Senior Care Auditors® and PenroseCertified®. “I created the new senior care auditing service as a way to hold caregivers accountable and to ensure seniors are okay, even if they are living alone in their own home. We check on seniors and report back to their loved-ones.”
How's Your Mom Doing? 