Assisted Living & Memory Care: What Families Need to Know Before a Crisis

Choosing assisted living or memory care for a loved one is one of the most difficult decisions families ever have to make. Many families wait until they are in crisis mode, not realizing how many options and resources are available before that point.

In this episode, we sit down with dementia care specialist Emily Baratta and healthcare professional Tara Scartocci to talk about assisted living, memory care, dementia support, and how families can navigate the transition.

We discuss the biggest misconceptions about assisted living, how memory care works, how residents are assessed and placed in the right level of care, what daily life actually looks like in memory care, and how communities support both residents and their families through the transition.

If you are caring for an aging parent, supporting a loved one with dementia, or planning ahead for long-term care, this episode provides practical insight into how assisted living and memory care really work and what families should know before making a decision.

For Mature Audiences Only is a podcast dedicated to real conversations, honest stories, and practical guidance for families navigating caregiving, aging, and senior living.

If this episode resonated with you, follow the show, leave a review, and share it with someone who may need support.

Presented by Archer Law Office https://archerelderlaw.com

Music provided by MIBE https://mibemusic.com/

Transcript

Shannon 0:02

Welcome back to For Mature Audiences Only, presented by Archer Law Office, the podcast where we break down complex aging, caregiving, and elder care topics into clear, practical guidance that you can actually use.

Mary 0:14

We're your hosts Mary Shapiro and Shannon Johnson, senior resource specialists at Archer Law Office. And each week we sit down with trusted professionals to help older adults and caregivers navigate real life challenges with less stress and more confidence. If you're caring for an aging parent, supporting a loved one with a serious illness, or planning ahead for yourself, this is an essential conversation. This is for mature audiences only, presented by Archer Law Office. Let's get started. Today we welcome Emily Barrata, who is the dementia care specialist at Carolyn East Brunswick Assisted Living. Emily has worked in a variety of settings, including nursing homes, assisted livings, and acute psychiatry. Emily is an occupational therapist and holds multiple certifications in dementia care. She brings that dementia care expertise when assisting staff and families with caring for each person living with dementia. She is also instrumental in developing personalized care plans for residents using their life story.

Shannon 1:25

We are also joined by Tara Scartocci. With more than 15 years in health care, her background includes leading memory care and assisted living communities, working as a clinical liaison in acute and subacute settings, also supporting healthcare operations as an assistant administrator. Today, Tara serves as Director of Community Outreach and Marketing, where she helps individuals and families understand their care options and connects them with the right resources. Her mission is to guide people to the care they need and to ensure they feel supported during life's most important transitions. Tara and Emily, thank you guys so much for coming in today to do this episode of the podcast. We're very excited to have you guys on to talk about living, talk about memory care, talk about all the things that go into that facet of senior living.

Mary 2:09

It's such a big topic right now. A lot of people have been asking us those questions. So it's fun to have you guys here to answer them.

Shannon 2:16

Exactly. The professionals that that live and breathe this every single day. We all know this job never stops. It's 24-7. We don't get any breaks, any days off, any of that kind of stuff, all right?

Emily 2:26

Glad we could be here.

What Assisted Living Really Is

Shannon 2:27

Yeah, absolutely. So, Tara, in your own words, could you please explain to us, or how would you describe an assisted living to a prospective family?

Tara 2:36

Assisted living is basically like you have your own apartment, but you have the support when you need it. So not everybody needs support. Some people come in, they're independent, they just need more of that structured lifestyle. So they come in, they have their apartment, it feels like home. And when they need those services, they can be added on, whether it be nursing services, um, clinical meaning, med management. And we can get into the more specifics of what care one does later in this podcast. But um, whether it be med management, assistance with bathing, dressing, it's there when you need it. So it's basically, it's just basically like you're moving into an apartment and you have the support when needed. You don't have to do the cooking and cleaning. We got you. So that's that's really it.

Emily 3:26

Or laundry.

Mary 3:27

That or that sells it for me. I don't want to cook, clean, have laundry. Sign me up. Correct.

Shannon 3:35

So, what are like the overall care philosophies of communities like care ones?

Tara 3:39

Yeah, so it's pretty simple. We are people caring for people. That's ultimately what our goal is. It's not so many people, when they are looking at someone, they look at a diagnosis, and that's not what we're doing. We are seeing the person where they are, we're honoring them every day. It's not like we have to do this, this, this task-oriented. It's based off of the person. So, yeah, I would say the philosophy is simple. People caring for people.

Shannon 4:14

We love that.

Mary 4:14

Um and it's individualized, it isn't cookie-cutter.

Shannon 4:18

How do you determine whether someone is appropriate for uh assisted living? And how do you determine what kind of care level they need?

Mary 4:25

Yeah, what's the process if someone is looking to move into assisted living?

Shannon 4:28

Walk us through the whole thing. Family comes in, I need assisted living, terrible.

Mary 4:32

The abridged version.

Tara 4:34

Yeah. So I need assisted living. Um it's based off of an assessment that's done. So the difference between care one and other assisted livings is that there's two assessments that are done. It's the director of nursing who's doing an assessment, and then it's my lovely friend sitting next to me, Emily Virata, our dementia specialist, that's doing an assessment as well. And the thing with assistant living is people always ask, well, what makes me sniff skilled nursing and what makes me assistant living? Well, it's a silly question. It's a tough question. Um, because care one, we are kind of like the we wrote the book in what the new assistant living model is. And I'm doing air quotes. You can't see me doing that. Um we wrote the book prior to COVID. People were taking in these walky, talky, independent individuals. Now they've kind of switched to more of that clinical, hoyer lift, wound care, things like that. Carowan's been doing this all along. And so I like to say we are a better alternative. No, that sounds terrible to a skilled nursing just because it is more home-like. Does that answer the question? Because I like to ramble and I can go on and up.

Shannon 5:49

Ramble away.

Tara 5:50

Yeah, I kind of went into your next question.

Shannon 5:53

We want all the info that you have here to give us. So absolutely.

Mary 5:57

How long does an assessment take? If someone was the nursing assessment, is it it can be an hour?

Emily 6:05

Is it be really short because we can, if they're coming from a different community, we get the clinicals beforehand. Right. I say because you can have someone come directly to you from a hospital or and as the dementia care specialist speaking on my assessment, I can be anything that the person needs me to be. So I am very rarely walking in saying, I'm the dementia care specialist from Caravan. So I've been from the insurance company, I've been a friend of the son of the potential person coming in. Sure. And I'm looking at a lot of different things that we can kind of get into, but it can take me 10 minutes because they might not be thrilled that I'm there. Or we take as much time as they allow us to. I did one yesterday and it was about 30 minutes just getting to know the person. Sure.

Shannon 6:51

So when someone comes in for an AL assessment, is it after a conversation with your team when you decide if you have to come in and do your portion of it?

Dementia Specialist Role And Family Support

Emily 6:58

Yes. So I think, you know, even from the tour moment that they come in, our marketing team is very skilled at kind of asking the right questions to see is this true assisted living or would they benefit from memory care? And then if we really deem that, we might even they might call me into the tour so I can ask additional questions. And then if it's even on the verge of potentially memory care, I'll go out just to make sure that we have them in the safest and best spot for them.

Shannon 7:28

So could you really quickly, Emily, tell us kind of everything that your role entails? Your role is everything. It's very specific to your company. Not a lot of other associated companies or memory cares have someone like you in all of your building. So could you touch on one of these?

Mary 7:44

And I do have a very specific skill set.

Tara 7:46

Emily is the secret sauce. Like she is that special sauce that really seals the deals at Care One. Thank you. Yeah.

Emily 7:54

Yes, my role is unique, like you said, Shannon and Tara and all of you, but it's not the easiest thing to describe, but it's really just filling in a lot of the gaps that I think other communities might not be able to fill just because I have the freedom to do what I need to do each day. So I assist, like I said, in the tours. So I'm there from the very beginning of someone moving in, the journey that the family's on, and then I assist them through the transition to moving in, which can be really a lot for families and for the person, the resident moving in. I do family support groups to try to just help them through the journey that their loved one is on. Sensory hours, I can, you know, I could just keep going. It's very, very unique, but it fills in some of those gaps that I think are missing in potentially some other communities just because it's the activity staff doing it or it's the uh marketing director trying to do it and just having the knowledge that I have and the dementia expertise and the trainings that I've gotten, I just can support them through the journey.

Shannon 9:02

Do you find most families are reluctant to move their loved one to a memory care versus to the assisted living side of the building?

Emily 9:10

I don't think so. I mean, there definitely are people that don't truly, like on paper, and that's kind of what Tara is saying, don't have like the true diagnosis of dementia, but we still kind of figure out that they potentially will do better in memory care. And that's just an open conversation with the family of we want this to be successful, right? We want them to have the best success. We don't want to ideally move them to assisted living, knowing that's not the right environment and have to move them.

Mary 9:40

Yeah, right.

Emily 9:40

So it it really is just having that open conversation at the start after the assessment, going on with the marketer and making sure that we're just really explaining where they would best fit and where we think they'll best fit.

Tara 9:53

And I think sharing like some of the success stories that we've had. Some people think just because you start in moderate, the only way to go is to advanced, which it's not. A lot of times we've had people start in moderate, they graduated to mild, and one of them is now thriving in assisted living. So it doesn't always have to be that way. So I think sharing that with them eases their mind a little bit.

Mary 10:16

Just because you're getting them at one snapshot in time, because some things happened that they now need community living for safety, for whatever the case may be. And then once you all get involved and things get managed, yeah, medicines are being given regularly, and there's activities and stimulation that they may see a positive change. And I think a lot of people don't realize that.

Emily 10:42

And that's when we openly have a conversation about the benefits versus the you know, the possible changes that would happen if we move them. So then again, it's just that open communication with the family on where they might best be, and that might be a move, and that might not be a move to another, and we didn't describe neighborhoods, but to another neighborhood.

Memory Care Neighborhoods By Stage

Shannon 11:01

Yeah, can you can you talk about the neighborhoods and the different ones you have? How you guys kind of came to separating the two and learning the differences between them all?

Emily 11:09

Yeah, so the specific building that I work at, East Brunswick, opened in 2020. We had at that point one neighborhood because that was we were growing, and it's just organically kind of moved into having an earlier stage neighborhood. Um, the neighborhoods are about 17 residents in each neighborhood, so it's this small, quaint feel, and we have that earlier mild stage, and then we really, just because of the need, have two neighborhoods that are more in like the middle stages of their dementia, which is where we're finding a lot of people either they waited because they were doing okay at home, and we really see that they would benefit from more of that moderate stage, and then we do really pride ourselves on the late stage advanced neighborhood, which is our last neighborhood, a lot of residents on hospice care and things like that. So we really do that continuum to goal have them age in place, maybe move neighborhoods, but be in that same community with the same concepts. Sure.

Mary 12:09

And for listeners that don't know what that looks like or may have a family member that could benefit, can you maybe describe some of the behaviors or what a mod or more advanced dementia would look like? Because people listening may have loved ones that may fit that and not know what that term means.

Emily 12:32

Yes. So it is complex because we're looking, like we said in the beginning, very individualized because we also know the neighborhoods at this point and who would do well on the neighborhood that's already so developed. But the main thing that I'm looking at as the dementia care specialist is language skills, the social ability to kind of have a back and forth conversation potentially, how much assistance they need with ADLs, but not looking physically how much assistance they need, how much queuing, the type of cueing that they per might need. So that could be, and the the grading or the adapting of cueing is very simply is setup, then verbal cueing, then verbal and visual cueing, and then verbal, visual, and tactile cueing all together. So there's different kinds of things that I'm looking at. And like you said before, during the assessment, that could be done in 10 minutes by asking them, where's your toothbrush? And they are able to find it inside a cabinet. I know that they're problem solving, I know that they're sequencing, I know that they know what I'm asking for. Um, so it's just looking at where that person and their skills are to then match the neighborhood and the type of assistance that we're providing. Because every neighborhood, that's the biggest thing, is every neighborhood has a different level of assistance that the staff is providing to make them sure they have as independent needs.

Tara 13:54

Yes. And the um the mild neighborhood, I coin this term. It's my neighborhood of unicorns because it's that person. It's a such a unique thing that we have. Yeah. It's the person that would probably get put in a regular assistant living and would get lost in all of the hustle and bustle. Sure. They just do better in the smaller, more structured environment. So that's why it's my neighborhood of unicorns because they are just such a unique group of individual individuals. So I love that.

Shannon 14:23

So are you guys constantly, I don't want to use the word monitoring, but keeping an eye on your assistant living residents in the event that they need to move to one of your Member Care neighborhoods?

Tara 14:32

We probably meet about that monthly, maybe more so than that. To kind of and she, so Emily, our it's so funny because all of our assistant living residents know who Emily is. So if Emily's she's like the kiss, she's they're like, nope, we don't need you here. Why are you why why is she coming here to talk to me? I mean, no, I don't need you. It's hysterical. But she's got a couple people. Like it doesn't equal movement. It's cute though, right?

Emily 15:02

Yeah. But yes, we're always monitoring. Um, some people, their families decided on this unique building because we have that, so that they know that they're showing very early signs they actually have a diagnosis of dementia. And the goal and the plan, you know, not goal, but the plan is for them to eventually move to the memory care.

Mary 15:23

So it's it's good to kind of have that even again during the tour and during the discovery kind of aspect to really figure that out so that I can continue and monitor and just and that gives peace of mind because then their loved one is in one community and can just move through the neighborhood if need be.

Emily 15:43

Transition smooth as possible.

Tracking Changes And Moving Neighborhoods

Shannon 15:45

So let's talk about some of the other resources you guys have with your community. Do you guys have um like residence physicians come in? Do you have specialists come in and stuff like that for your clients? For your residents, I should say.

Tara 15:56

We do. So obviously, we have um geriatricians that come and see them. We have dermatology, podiatry, we can arrange for um dental, we can arrange for eye, we can arrange for audiology. What am I missing? We have psychiatry, geriatric psychiatry, psychology, talk therapy. Am I missing anything, and I think that was very good.

Emily 16:22

Maybe, maybe one, but I don't know.

Shannon 16:24

I guess a good thing for our listeners to know because they're always concerned about, you know, when they move into a community, how much they're still going to have to do as far as coming and getting their loved one and taking them out places, but you guys make it easier for them by having everything kind of come in-house for them.

Tara 16:36

And we have our own in-house physical therapy, occupational therapy, and speech therapy. So it's not an outside agency coming in with their like little bag of tricks. Right. It's our own team who has their own gym, and that way we can actually get them on therapy services faster. It's not that great.

Emily 16:53

So it's your own team sharing the same philosophies of the same companies, they go through, yeah, they go through the same education, and it's really nice because I worked as an occupational therapist with Care One at in a Harmony Village, and it really the benefit is that if that person's not doing well in this moment, say they're having a behavior, they're having a a you know, something going on, they can come back later because they're in-house, and that's one of the biggest differences between someone coming in. It it can work, it could be the perfect hour of their day, but here we can have we're scheduled Sally for Tuesday, and if Sally's uh Tuesday morning is not doing well, we can go back Tuesday afternoon and still potentially be able to see her. So it's really a benefit, and it's a really cool aspect that we have it in-house. It works. A day in the life.

Shannon 17:43

What's a day in the life like in assisted living and in memory care?

Tara 17:47

That's a really awesome question, Shannon, because there is no day in the life. That's an awesome answer. There is no day in the life. We it's their house. We're just working there and we are just going with the flow of what they want. If they want to wake up, that is a really great answer, right?

Shannon 18:02

That is a great answer.

Tara 18:03

Yeah, because there really is no day in the life. If you want to eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at midnight because you're hungry, then go ahead, do it. You want to sleep in until 11, go ahead and do it. The next day, if you want to follow the calendar and be task-driven, fine. Like we are just meeting them where they are that day.

Medical Services That Come To You

Emily 18:22

And I think that's something that the families sometimes have a difficult time with because I actually was I was just talking to a family and I said, mom didn't want to wake up at 7 a.m., right? And it's a learning curve for the family because we are so flexible because we know it works. Like if mom's yelling at us and attempting potentially to hit us at 7 a.m., that's so early. Right. Right. Like we can let her be, make keep her safe, and then try at 8. Try at 7:30, even, right? Like or try at 12, right? Like it doesn't have to be so like specific, yeah, structured. Um, and they won't miss a meal, right? Like we have so much food and we have all we do is eat. Right. So, like it's like they're like, but what about breakfast? I was like, breakfast could be at 11:30. Like, so that's what the beauty of um, you know, again, the smaller neighborhoods, the staff know the residents, but also are so flexible because they know that every person, like, think about us, right? We don't, maybe we do, but we don't wake up every single day at the exact same moment. Unless we have an alignment, I would not wake up at the exact same moment. So there's some days you want to sleep in, there's some days you want to shower in the morning, there's some days you want to shower at night. Right. And that's the beauty of you know, them just getting to know them and listening to them.

Shannon 19:38

So you touched on the families. How do you help the families, the loved ones, also transition when they bring their loved one to your facility? Now they may not be, they're not the primary caregiver anymore. So, what's the transition like for the families also?

Emily 19:50

So we talk about that before they move in, a lot, especially if they are the primary caregiver for them before they come to us. We talk about kind of a loss of role and kind of a grieving process of a change for them. The whole process and the whole journey for some families is a grieving process. So we we go through that whole concept. But the transition is just a lot of communicating with me so that I can show them pictures. I can say, you know, mom or or wife or brother, whoever it is, is not having beautiful moments every moment, but here's a moment of him in bingo or in drum and music exercise and smiling and enjoying it. Like that's not a lie, you know, it's it's there, it's perfect. And then being honest, right? Like having those open communications that it's not always gonna be peachy. We're gonna have ups and downs. Um, I just you know had a uh wife and husband visit today and it was not easy, right? It was really, really difficult. And that's my role is to help during the first few visits if they want me to and I I can, but then also to walk off the neighborhood and be there for the the person that was just visiting and seeing their loved one for the first or second time since moving in and going through those emotions with them. So it's it's a lot of just supporting throughout the journey.

Mary 21:18

Oh, that's great. They I know in particular we had conversation about spouses, how you know their whole I know we tell our clients that they're still caregivers, they're just not doing the heavy lifting. Yeah, right. And their loved one moves in.

Emily 21:32

Yeah, and you can be the spouse, right? You could be that relationship that you were like look potentially looking for or missing. Our goal is to try to get back to that if we can, right?

A Flexible Day In The Life

Shannon 21:41

So yeah, that's awesome. We share that same common goal too. When they get the families back to being somewhere, whatever their family role is in crisis anymore. Getting back to being that husband or that daughter or that grandchildren.

Emily 21:52

We don't want to be in crisis if at all possible. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah.

Shannon 21:57

Speaking of crisis, do you find most families? Come to you in crisis mode.

Tara 22:01

Yes. That's what we thrive in with we thrive with the crisis. No, because it's because it's a tough decision. Like if you're moving your loved one in, um, you want to keep them home as long as possible.

Shannon 22:14

Right.

Tara 22:14

And sometimes it's a little too long. So they're they're coming. It's a lot of times it is the spouses that are waiting until they're in that crisis mode, but we can kind of walk them through it and get someone in quickly if needed. That's why we are so awesome. Because I have my Emily who can assist me with all of that when we do have that, you know.

Emily 22:35

Yeah. Our goal is for it not to be like feel rushed for us, but also for the family. Like, we don't want it to be. It's a big adjustment to have to happen. But quickly and overnight. We do also thrive and can do the crisis. We're like, oh, okay, tomorrow, yeah. And like we all jump out and do whatever we need to do. I'll help you, whatever you need me to do. We got it. Um, yeah. So I mean, we would hope that it's more planned out, that the family is kind of again getting the support that they need from support groups and like all of that stuff. But we do also have people move in toward yesterday.

Mary 23:14

Yes. I think there's some not stigma with assisted living, but some thought process behind it, it's a long process to do that it can move just as quick as you're getting discharged from a hospital and you need a safe place to go.

Shannon 23:31

So there's typically like different care levels within the framework of the buildings. How often is someone reassessed? Is it kind of when you guys think it's best? Is it every 30 days, every 60 days? What's your process like with reassessing care levels?

Helping Families Through The Transition

Tara 23:44

So it's really okay. It's supposed to be quarterly, but let's keep it real. It happens a lot more often than that. Whenever we see a change, we are reassessing and we are changing daily. So if we see that there's a change, we assess. The cool thing is that we keep the same caregivers in the assistant living, in the mild, in the moderate, in the advanced. They're with them every day. They're the ones that are seeing the changes. Emily is out on the floor walking, she's seeing the changes. I'm out there, like we are all very involved and we're monitoring these things. So if we see a change, we're gonna assess and see what we can do. Sometimes it's something simple, like a urinary tract infection. Yeah. And sometimes it's not. So we are constantly um.

Shannon 24:32

So that can really come from like anybody on your staff because everyone's working with the residents so closely.

Emily 24:37

I also always say we have um we call our care our aides care partners, and I always advocate to them, like and tell them you are the person that's going to see the changes, right? Like, again, I know that Tara's saying, I'm on the neighborhood, but I'm here right now, right? Like so, there's other things that we're doing that we're not there every moment. And the care partners, the nurses are there. So I always tell them, like, if you see them crying more, or if you see them limping, obviously, like it doesn't need to only be physical. It can be the emotional, it can be the cognitive, obviously. You gotta let us know because then we can really help them, right? Right? Like, and it we don't want people in distress. We want to make sure that we're managing as much as we can and monitoring the changes because we don't want to.

Tara 25:23

I think that's why our team, like our care partners, are so happy, is because we do involve them in the care so much. Like they really feel like they're a part of the team. I loved going in in the morning and like walking, and then my care partners would be like, Tara, I gotta tell you something. And I'd be like, I love this. I'm like, this is amazing. I like want you to tell me these things. Right. Um, and then because they know morning meeting every day is at 10 o'clock, and I'll bring it up in morning meeting. Yeah, but yeah, I mean, we have really good care partners, we really do. I don't have anything bad to say the backbone of the community that I've got to do.

Emily 25:55

I was just gonna say, like, it's the people that you need to have. They need to be good because if they're not, they're the ones doing the direct hands on exactly right, yeah.

Shannon 26:05

Right. So this can be an overwhelming process for families, for everyone involved. What are some misconceptions about there about assisted living memory care that you guys want to would dispel if you could?

Tara 26:18

A lot of times people think assisted living and memory care is nursing homes.

Shannon 26:21

Correct.

Tara 26:22

Um, and they don't even want to come and see it because they have this vision of a big nursing station with um wheelchairs all sitting around there, um, which that's not what we are. So when they come to East Brunswick, I mean you guys have been to East Brunswick, it looks like a hotel. And it should be that way. Like people should be able to live in a beautiful setting and have delicious food and get to do all of these fun activities. I always say, um, you know, when I'm old and we're seasoned, Terror.

Mary 26:55

We're seasoned.

Crisis Moves And Reassessing Care

Tara 26:56

Yeah. I'm going to live in East Brunswick, guys. I mean, I really am. I I I can't afford it, but if I'm going to We should all get a discount for working in the field, but it's neither here nor there. Let's get that locked in now. Let's get that locked in now. February 18th. Uh 22. No, but I would say that one of I would say the most common one is that assistant living is nursing home. Yeah.

Mary 27:24

I had a client that was so worried about touring because he equated it to jail. I'm gonna have to go to jail. Oh, yes. On the first building on the first tour we walked in, he wanted to know when he could move in. Oh because he had such a different perception. Exactly. He had such a wrong impression of what it was.

Shannon 27:44

Well, it's that generation, right? To them, you know, if you were going somewhere back in the 80s and 90s, it was the loony bin or the crazy house or nursing home to your example.

Tara 27:53

One yeah, what's the movie with Jack Nicholson? One flew over the cuckoo's nest. Like that's what they think it is. Yeah, no.

Emily 27:59

I mean, one thing that we do, and it's a very simple thing, but even through what we're saying, I think you probably hear it is like the language also, like it's a huge culture shift that we started right when we opened the building of like its neighborhood. It's not obviously like vomit ward, like you know what I mean. Like we're we're using language that promotes and one and that, and one of my favorite things, oh you cut me off, Mary. One of my favorite things is when we go on a bus trip and we're driving up and they're like, Oh, we're home. And I'm like, oh my gosh, like this is working, like this is a concept that works because the person living with dementia is so comfortable and they see the building even, or they see their neighborhood doors, and they're like, Oh, thank God. And like, because they might have been having an anxious moments somewhere else in the building, and they walk to the neighborhood doors and they're like, Oh, I'm home. And I'm like, that's what we want. We want them to have comfort here and to feel safe. And it's just uh one of the best things.

Shannon 29:03

Like when I see it, I'm like, oh my god, this is and speaking about your building, your specific East Brunswick building as a whole, you walk into it, it's bright, big windows, big glass doors. Does that play into the whole like entire concept of the whole building?

Mary 29:18

Like playing to the senses, it was was designed, it looks like with intention. Right. That's what I'm getting at.

Tara 29:24

We are lucky. We we were lucky at East Brunswick because we got to build the building from ground up. We didn't acquire it. So if care one was to have an assistant living everywhere, it would be what East Brunswick is. Um and I love it because in other communities, memory care is always the afterthought. It's always this big assistant living, and then the memory care is just the hallway. Yeah, with everybody grouped together. We want it to be different, and that's what we are. So we did the opposite. We have a small assistant living of I think it can go up to 36 people, and then we have 70 memory care apartments based off of cognitive need. And it's not a one size fits all. I mean, it's really not. We just because you have moderate memory care, if you're with someone with advanced, you're not gonna benefit from the same activities as them. Um it's just I can't say enough good things about our building. I really can't. And I yeah, I can. I can really.

Shannon 30:25

So what should families be looking for on a tour when it comes to your building?

Mary 30:30

Or questions they should ask.

Tara 30:33

Specific questions they should ask. Yeah. They already ask all of them.

Emily 30:37

Yeah, I mean, yeah, I was gonna say they kinda um no, but I mean we always I Or that you want to make sure that they know.

Mary 30:47

Like if they haven't asked the question, what's the the highlights you want to make sure that they know when they leave your tour?

Emily 30:55

I don't want to boast, but I think two things that set us apart is our education groups for the families. So we hold a monthly education group. I hold a monthly education group for the family so that it has a different topic every month, so that we kind of go through the big things, but it's very specific. It's it can be very specific to the person that is asking the question in the group because it's so it's not huge, right? It's just the families that are are being cared for and the resident being cared for, and then we do a spouse lunch, so that's another thing that I think it's growing because we have so many spouses now and I love it. I love it. So I do a spouse lunch and they just love it.

Mary 31:38

I mean, and that's it can I'm sure turn into almost like a spousal support group.

Emily 31:42

Oh, 100%. Yeah, it is definitely a spot for them to um laugh, to cry, to to just reminisce about the past, to talk about the difficulties, and then share with the other people, the other spouses. So that it's it's really a beautiful thing that we implemented probably three years ago, and it's just and you don't have to be a resident yet.

Tara 32:04

So, like if I have a prospective resident, you know, spouses can take a year to get because sure they'll just come and they'll attend her education, they'll come to the spouse luncheon. We invite them to our monthly family nights, which we have like 125 people come to our monthly family night.

Shannon 32:21

Wow, that's awesome!

Tara 32:22

It's an awesome community. I mean, it's I can't say enough good things. Like we have we have food, a full meal, a theme, it's a theme party. We have music, and it's just a good time. And you get to be with people who are going through the same journey that you're going through. So it's just nice.

Shannon 32:40

Point of contacts for families are very, very important. I'm sure your phone's probably ringing all the time, right? Once a family moves into the building, are they able to get in touch with the director of nursing, get in touch with yourself, get in touch with the executive director?

Tara 32:53

Yeah, so it's not just one person that's a point of contact, right? All of us as department heads are point of contacts. Um, if I can't answer a question, obviously I will give it to Emily or I'll give it to Ecta. Um, but it's not the I hate that Ecta's your executive director. Ecta's our executive director, who, by the way, um I have to shout her out. She is a she used to be our regional social worker, okay for care one. So she is very good at what she does. Okay. Um she has that background. She knows how to talk to people. She's very able to be nice and tender with them and so she likes to be the point of contact with everybody, but the she's the executive director, I guess. She so, but it's like Ecta, you know, there's like 106 people here. Um, we can help you, right? Yeah. Emily is really your point of contact if you are moving into the memory care. But like I said, all the department heads are really your point of contact. Would you agree with that?

Tour Questions And Family Education

Emily 33:49

Yeah, I mean, I have some a lot of it is nowadays more, I think, flexible. So I have a ton of text messages that are just again like sharing the pictures and things like that, but just quick updates, and then obviously we have the formal, more like email way. And then one big thing that we do is at least the initial two-week care conference with a family to really just touch base, and that's the whole team. So that's the director of nursing, that's myself, that's Ekta, the therapy team if they started on therapy. And we do that at two weeks because we really give them an idea of how they're doing, how they're adjusting, what we could be doing maybe better, what we could work on, and then the family can come to us with problems, with concerns, with thankful, you know, this is working so well. So it really is just a really good touch point at that two weeks to then get all the kinks out if there's any kinks, and then move forward.

Mary 34:48

So that's a really good kind of moment just to so lots of touch points, lots of constant feedback on both sides from families and that's staff to families.

Emily 35:01

That's one thing that the families always say is like communication, they obviously their loved one is potentially older. They've been to a rehab, they've been to potentially another assisted living before us, and they always say that our communication is at least much better, but is you know, really, really good because they're never really questioning like what's happening with their loved one. I always say I'm not gonna call you with every tearful moment because that's why you trust us. Right. Right. But we are going to talk about themes. We're gonna talk about what is going on with mom or whoever, your loved one, just so that we're all on the same page. So that when the psychiatrist or someone calls and says we want to increase mom's X, Y, and Z medication, it's not coming out of the blue. We had a conversation about it.

Mary 35:48

We know that that's they're not taken by surprise.

Emily 35:50

Yes, they know that that's something. Mom's not eating. We're gonna start this mood, you know, this appetite stimulant, it all makes sense. And it's not coming from left field.

Shannon 36:00

And those little nuggets go a long way. Just small communication goes a long way with the families. They just want to be kept in the line. Right. Yeah. They don't want to be surprised by it.

Mary 36:08

It was them 24-7 before they've moved in. So relinquishing some of that, I know, is difficult, you know, at least being up to date on how they're doing. And especially with dementia, they can't call their loved one to get an update or an accurate update.

Emily 36:24

That is true, too. They they can, and they're like, what is going on? I'm like, oh no, that's in it, heaven. Don't worry. It's just the news.

Tara 36:30

They're watching the news again. It's true. No, but I think that you do a good job because you are a lot of places will just call you when something bad happens. Emily sends pictures at least weekly to all of the families, like showing them their good moments. So it kind of builds a trust with them. 100%. Sure.

Emily 36:51

So when you are calling them with that bad moment, yeah. Or the harder qu the harder conversations. I had I did one this week of moving neighborhoods. That's never going to like be an easy conversation. Right. Because you're showing, you're no, you're expressing that we're seeing changes, right? Enough changes for them to potentially have benefit from a move. So, again, that just like having that trust in that relationship to then have that conversation, a more difficult conversation, it'll it obviously goes over smoother.

Shannon 37:21

You guys have been absolutely great today. So I mean, thank you guys so much for coming on. As we wrap it up, one thing that we have to ask before you guys go, because this is a crazy industry that we're all in. You gotta have a special kind of heart to do this job. Yes. So, you know, what's what's the why for the both of you asked why you guys are in this? Either one of you can go first.

Communication Systems And Care Conferences

Emily 37:40

Um, so I this is uh I'm an occupational therapist by trade, and I think that the reason I went into occupational therapy, which is a concept of a holistic look or you know, per um goal for the person is to look at them holistically. I really just loved that profession. I thought it was such a unique profession. I was a caregiver for both of my grandparents on my mom's side, so that really just drove the concept of wanting to work as an OT in the elder population. And then as an OT, I just quickly realized that I was, and everyone realized that I was very good with people living with dementia. So they would say, Emily's the dementia OT, give her that person. And I'm like, oh my god. So I quickly just formed a lot of skill because I needed to bill therapy for them. Um I know that's not the best why, but I think just realizing that I had a skill and that I love it. I just absolutely love seeing someone thrive and someone doing so well in every stage of their of their journey. I often say to staff, and they think I'm crazy, but I I love the latest stage of dementia because you still see such beautiful moments in such a different person, but they're still there. And that's one of those concepts that I talk to staff about all the time is that person is that person, and we just need to find them. And they might not be right here right now, but a hand massage, some music, spending time with them. You see this beautiful smile, and you're just like, This is why it's all worth it. Right.

Tara 39:27

So my why is not, I'm gonna ramble. So I'm just I mean, it's very simple. I just um I've always had a fondness for helping others since I was a child. I was always the person that wanted to help everyone, whether it be the girl that was getting picked on in school or the kid that was having trouble with his math. Like I always was the person that wanted to be there for everybody. And it kind of just followed me. I've done many different things in healthcare, but I like the community outreach marketing because I like being the first person that people get to speak to. And I don't just dismiss people. So just because you're not someone that can move into a care one building, I want to connect you to someone who can help you. I'm always helping. I'm always trying to meet people. When we're going, when Emily and I go and meet with professionals, I'm always like, oh my God, this person would benefit. Like, that's just what I do. I'm making the connections. I can't help it. That's just who I am. I want to help everyone I possibly can, and that's just the truth. Um, so that's really that's my why.

Mary 40:37

That's a great why.

Shannon 40:38

Yeah, absolutely.

Mary 40:39

Both of you.

Shannon 40:40

Yeah. You guys have been great guests.

Mary 40:41

Yeah, thank you again so much for having us.

Shannon 40:45

Yeah, thank you guys so much for joining us, of course. Thank you for coming on, sharing insight about what you guys do. I mean, we really, really love the operation that you guys have going on over there.

Tara 40:54

So we really love the operation that you guys have going on here. We love working with you guys. Thank you. Thank you.

Shannon 41:02

If you found this episode helpful, please be sure to subscribe, leave a review, and share it with someone that it could benefit.

Mary 41:08

Just remember, you don't have to navigate aging or caregiving alone.

Shannon 41:12

If today's conversation raised questions about elderlaw, long-term care, or planning ahead, please visit jerseyelderlaw.com or call 609-842-9200 to find resources and support.

Mary 41:26

This is for mature audiences only, presented by Archer Law Office. Until next time, keep pushing forward and keep the conversation going.