We recently moved my 66 year old uncle who has Parkinson's, depression, anxiety and partial blindness from his home to an assisted living residence. He is free to go in and out of the facility. Recently with the change in his medications it has caused him hallucinations and feelings of persecution. He recently wandered onto the streets in claiming he needed to buy something at the store but ended up falling and requiring stitches. Luckily staff from the assisted living received a call from the hospital and brought him back. Due to his fragile and fluctuating mental state (which most assisted living residents do not have), I am wondering what is the next step in our options for a cared living facility as he may no longer fit in an assisted living situation. Nursing home? Enclosed dementia home? Mental health community?
Assisted Living has many benefits and one of the major benefit is they allow care for the family members which they mostly need. Also, Assisted Living provides quicker emergency responses and gives seniors their personal space.
The Assisted Living is wonderful, but they have informed my wife that if she becomes too much to handle they will send her to the nursing home which is part of the facility.
With people living much longer, it is often the children who now are much older and like I, retired. My wife is the POA and primary decision maker. She has a lot on her plate, dealing with her father's death, her mother mental illness, paying the bill and still working.
It is not like the days of old, I never knew my grandfathers or one of my grandmothers. My father died young at 65 and my mother live a healthy life except for the last two years, she passed away at 88. That was 5 years ago. My father-in-law lived to 93.5 years and my mother-in-law is 85 and suffering from dementia. She doesn't even know her husband has died.