Ep. 6: THE OPEN MIC | Real Stories from the Front Lines of Care

 "The most powerful stories in healthcare aren't in textbooks—they’re in the hearts of the people doing the work. Tonight, the mic is yours." Tonight at 8:45 PM, we are opening the floor. Whether you work in Assisted Living, Skilled Nursing, Hospitals, or Psych Care, you have that one story. The resident who surprised you, the patient who taught you a life lesson, or the moment you realized exactly why you were called to this profession. Join us for a 30-minute deep dive into the "Human" side of Senior Care. Big News: We’ve been working behind the scenes to bring you the best in the industry! We are officially booking special guests months in advance—wait until you see who we have lined up for the rest of the year. We’ll be sharing more on tonight's stream!

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:11

Hello, everyone. Welcome to On the Road 2026. Catching up with my former peers 30 years later. Hello, everyone. I'm Charles Day with Day to Day Senior Care. And thank you very much for uh coming on tonight. And first and foremost, again, uh we uh I want to thank every viewer and every new subscriber that's been on um that's come on to our um whether Facebook or LinkedIn or Instagram or um YouTube and especially YouTube because YouTube I just I can't keep up, but it's growing so fast. Our subscribers, over 182. I haven't looked yet in the last few hours, but thank you all. And our views are in in less than 90 days are close to 20,000 views. So I really I I don't know what I'm doing, but I'm very happy, very humbled, and I just want to continue doing what I'm doing. We have a great lineup that's coming over the next several weeks. We've got experts in the field, we've got day-to-day uh staff that are gonna be coming on. We've got um people in all different departments and in different um facilities, whether it's hospitals. I got a special event for for uh Southside Hospital where I worked for 12 or 12 years, and I'm just very excited. But tonight, tonight is pretty much like the title says. Um, I have a little script here because I do go off script now and then. Um so it's called the Senior Care on the Road, the Open Mic. Career Defining Moments. So tonight is a very special edition of our show. We're calling it open mic for a reason. So for the next half hour, we are going, we are clearing the schedule to hear from the heart of the industry. We're talking to the CNAs, the nurses, the administrators, the hospital staff, and those working in psychiatric and memory care. You know, being a caregiver isn't a job, it's a collection of moments. We all know that. Some are heavy, some are hilarious, and some change the way you see the world. But tonight we want to hear your story, yours. What is it? What is that one memorable moment in your career that stayed with you? Okay, and I'm going to open up the chat. Hold on, put the chat on this chat. I'm gonna say hello. This is what I love about this studio. I'm gonna say hello, and it goes out to all uh streaming Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube tonight. And I'm just writing hello everyone. So this is where you can come in and leave a chat. And if you're interested in coming in this spot right below me, live, I will send you a link. What you'll do is you'll let me know on the comment, and I'll send it to your uh Facebook message, or I'll post it right there and a link, and you come right in, share your story, and then uh you're off. All right. And I know some people would rather just uh leave a leave a comment, and we can certainly answer the comment, or we can listen. I mean, we can read what you wrote about your memorable moment, okay? So I'm gonna be on script, off script, and I'm gonna try and fix this mic this way. Okay, there we go. All right. So before we open the lines, so to say, okay, I just want to reflect on uh on why we're doing this. In the fast-paced environment of a nursing home or a busy hospital uh unit, we often don't get the chance to process the things we see. We move from one room to the next, one crisis to the next. But tonight we're hitting the pause button. So by listening to anyone's memorable moment, would be awesome. Just put a comment in that you would like to share. Okay, we've already we've already uh established that this on the road series, even though I'm catching up with my former peers 30 years later, and I've already got some scheduled out for the next coming months. Some great, great, inspiring stories are coming, folks. Real stuff, raw footage. You get to see the life of healthcare workers, those that work with senior care, those that work with psychiatric patients. I'm bringing it all in here. It's all coming in, and we're all just gonna see it and hear from it, um, and just see what it's like in our in our world, our career. So, and I understand a lot of people come in and they hate this hospital, that they dread that nursing home, or they don't want to go near that assisted living facility. But let me tell you folks, all right, every every any any uh career you're in, any environment, whether it's the trade field or the legal field or or um policing, whatever, everyone's got pros and cons about you know the services that are being given. I'm just sharing with everyone the fact that there are so many passionate hearts, thousands and thousands, tens of thousands, including myself, that have been in this business for decades because we love what we do and we're compassionate with those we serve. Very important, and that's why I'm doing these podcasts. Okay, so again, the lines are open. Who's first on the mic tonight? Tell us your name, where you work, and the moment you'll never forget.

SPEAKER_00 6:52

Okay. So far, I'm hearing crickets.

SPEAKER_01 7:02

That's okay. All right, though many people are, you know, I get it, you know, that sometimes, especially the time of night, and I do appreciate you listening in. And most of our views I noticed come in the following day, the day after. So I'll just share a little bit of some memory uh moments um that I've had in the business. And uh as we continue to go forward, um we're going to you know assure again that we stay on time schedule Thursdays at 7:30 p.m. running this business, uh, day-to-day senior care. There are moments like today that um I didn't expect a couple of things to happen. Um, but I was working with a client and then I received a call that one of uh our companions had to leave early uh with a client that we have at one of our assisted livings that we're in. And so guess who had to cover those two and a half, three hours? Me. So that's okay. I love doing coverage. I was an aide for many, many years. Um, and still um I still love working with with elderly in any capacity, seniors in any capacity, whether I'm in there as a companion or coming in as as the you know the boss and you know, checking on and see how my my clients are doing. Um we have a great uh we have a great bunch of clients um that we are serving, and I'm very grateful that uh we are growing so fast. Um so uh I can give you a memorable moment in uh my career. Uh let's see uh, for instance, um survey time in the assisted living versus survey time in a nursing home. So in the in the in the uh assisted living facilities, they're usually there a couple of days. Um but during those time during those times that they're there, they're going, they're scrubbing through everything. They're going through environmental services, they're going through administration, case management, obviously ancillary services, but mostly their primary uh target is the um nursing and the care portion of of the assisted living facility. So they're going into the medical records, they're looking at the charts, they're looking at the medical administration records, they call them the MARs, they're looking to see how care is rendered, they're looking to see if everyone's staying within the policy and procedures and the regulations from New York State, Department of Health, that the uh residents are being cared for, uh with, you know, and not above what is um allowed in assisted living, depending on which assisted living has the uh enhanced licenses or the special needs licenses. They look at the dementia uh care units, they do that, you know, they do all their audits, they check charts, they look at electronic records, they interview clients, they interview staff, they interview families. Pretty intense. Now, double that in a nursing home. Nursing home, they could be there six days, they can seven, eight. Um, it's usually a minimum of five to six days. Um, and uh it it is another uh uh process of of oversight when they use their survey. They're looking at all the different departments and definitely in nursing care. They're looking at the minimum, you know, what the care is on the floors. They go to, and you know what? They also bring with them a wealth of information ahead of time. People that have called in, families that have called in and complained, residents have called and complained. They sort through some of them, some of them they've closed, some of they, some of them are left open. They decide, well, you know what, while we're there in the nursing home or the assisted living home, we're going to uh you know, follow up on the on this incident report right there. Where's the administrator? Where's the executive director? Because they always meet with them first upon entry, okay? Even though some of their uh other staff members may or may already be heading toward the floors, okay? Um, but anyway, so my memorable moments is just uh, you know, uh many times where you know we'd be in the middle of um of doing a lot of um you know, a lot of day-to-day uh activities, and then all of a sudden, boom, they're there. Unannounced visit. So I always, always um remember um having to hustle and bustle, you know, get all the staff together, secretly do our uh department um, you know, gatherings once they're uh on the floor. And you know, I don't want to get into all the secrets of uh how we manage, you know, the uh the flow while the uh while the um department of health is there. But well, you know, obviously it's all done within you know within the um the routine of of assurance that you know everything is that we that we've crossed our T's and dotted our I's so we just do another comprehensive um overview of of all our uh departments. So, and we just uh you know, we're ready for them, you know, we're always ready. Um, when you're a facility that uh, you know, um is doing well and you know uh you're getting your annual surveys, you want to make sure that you know, whatever you learned from the last survey in your plan of correction and that you, you know, applied that and submitted that, you know, after uh you know meticulous oversight and drafting uh before the final product goes out because you only have about 10 working days to get that plan of correction to the uh to the state. But um, very important that uh, you know, the next survey is coming. You already got those in place, and what can you do to improve? So all right. I was given some time here for anyone that uh would like to chat, um, share a memorable moment. We're on for 30 minutes. Okay, let me think of another memorable moment. Um, yeah, I remember when I was working in um Southside Hospital, and uh I had a whole bunch of peers. They were the best. There's so many of them. I've reached out. Um, some of them are gonna be scheduled to come on, and I'm really excited to have them on for 30 minutes because you're gonna be laughing, folks. Some of them got some uh good war stories, especially about Mawa, me. Um, I don't want to share any of that because they're gonna share it and you're gonna be laughing. Um, you know, some things that you know you don't expect. Um, you know, um, but I do remember a memorable moment. Um, we had this one gentleman on our unit, and every day um before I started that unit as an aide, before, you know, psych aide, and go on my shift uh to work my uh 4 to 12. I did mostly evenings because I was working day jobs. You know, you go in there and you know, you have that one special patient that you're always aware of, the one that's been on a one-to-one, the one that's on a uh, you know, arm's length uh supervision um at all times. This guy was was definitely definitely had a psychotic issue. And um, but the problem was is he was fine with the females. He was always protective of the females. And then all of a sudden, if somebody did something to a female, he'd start focusing on you. His fists would start to clench. And if we didn't get to him in time, he'd be trying to knock somebody out. That's how dangerous he was. But uh, you know, we've had a we had to put him on um, you know, one-to-ones uh in the room. Sometimes we'd have to use the four-point restraints as restraints as per doctor orders, um, and we'd have to follow that. Um, but I I remember that it was a very, very um, you know, memorable moment because uh all of us were very nervous because the what he could trigger in one moment. One moment he's smiling at you, the next moment you're feeling the side of your face red because you just got hit, you know. So, you know, it was tough chairs being thrown at us. Um, but you know what it was? It was the peers I worked with, and they don't know who they are, especially on Facebook, because many of them are there still today, and we and we we do see each other um on Facebook and comment on each, you know, on each other's posts and stuff. Um just a great bunch of people. But if it wasn't for those nurses, those nurses, I'm telling you, there would have been some incidents that I would have gotten very hurt. Um, and you know, the same for other people. We all we were all a team, great team. And I worked with them for so many years. It was actually because I did per diem, it was actually longer than that because I was working in the industry as a director in assisted living, and I was still per diem at night. And a few other people that were working with me, one person I had uh gotten him some employment there to do evening shifts. So, you know, we would work the days in in the assisted living, and then it, you know, we get there four or five, maybe six o'clock because we got out of work late, and then we jump on the unit, and there's our schedule. Oh, you're gonna be in uh room 216, okay? You're with a one-to-one uh or two to one, you know. We had this one guy that had uh uh one of the Hannibal mask because he was a spitter and a biter, and he was a three to one. There's another memorable moment, but we're gonna talk about all that on the road with the my special guests from Southside Hospital, okay, when the psych units were the big thing, okay. In the early 2000s, they were still running because King's Park and the other um pilgrim and everybody was downside and downsizing mental health through the 90s. That's another whole thing, a series I could talk about on our uh other uh podcast, Care with Confidence, and um some other things. Um, but anyway, yeah, let's see. Let's see, I'm gonna just check something real quick. Go on to Facebook because sometimes with this new technology, people could be sending something and I'm just not seeing it. I could be doing something wrong on the studio. I'm surprised I got this far, folks. With all this technology. Okay, I'm on Facebook and I'm checking things out here. Okay, well, let's see what we got here. Okay, and I'll try to try LinkedIn just to make sure LinkedIn. All right, sorry folks. Uh comment while I'm still on live. Okay, yeah, so again, um we will run this this special uh series um with the open mic. Uh we won't have guests every week, but for those who would like to submit a question, I'll be uh sending out some clips on this uh on this um evening that we did. The open mic, and we'll run these uh once or twice throughout the each month. Um just so I can, you know, because people want to hear about it. They want to hear about our stories. That's why they're coming. They want to see what you know who's who I'm gonna be visiting on the road here. Okay, so um I'm gonna bring them that entertainment. Um, I again I have some very special guests. So we're looking forward to the spring and the summer. This is gonna be a big, big, big spring and summer for us here on the road series. So let's see how much time we have left. Okay. This now I also wrote a few things here too. Um where is it? Uh yeah. Okay. So as we start to wind down tonight's open mic, um one thing I want to also share is if you have a story that especially um something that um you feel uh families of loved ones would benefit from, dm me. Um you can certainly come on for as a special guest too. You don't have to be a former peer of mine, folks. You can DM me or call me, and we will schedule an event together um on the road series um and uh share your share your wonderful stories. Um I am looking for certain people to interview um on a particular uh um information that I feel would be pertinent for um families and and our clients who are we direct to YouTube because most of our podcasts are going to YouTube, which is really cool too. I just found out um that uh the uh RSS feeds like Apple Podcasts and you know the audio feeds where you don't have the video. Now they're integrating video, they're allowing video to go in with the audio. So that's really cool because we've already got a lot of those venues like iHeartRadio, Spotify, Apple. So I'm looking forward to a further reach so we can let families and loved ones know about the complexities of healthcare. We run three different uh three different podcasts. We do this on the road, but we also do a care with confidence series where we're pretty open to a lot of things um with special guests about the industry. I have staff members coming on um to share about our program. I'd be happy to have other, you know, competitors come on and share their stories and how they are doing. Um, and of course, especially home care agencies. I'm not a medical agency right now. I'll get my operator's license when I feel I'm ready to uh to put in that application. I'm not too worried because I'm still an active licensed nursing administrator with 30 years experience in the field. They know I'm serious. They know I want to be able to help people further than just non-medical. So we'll get that medical license down the road here in New York. And uh we'll we'll also be um beginning in in Maine this year. We're going up in Maine. I've I've had this planned for a while, so we're gonna go up there. But I'll be um wanting to interview. I'll have some um some great guests from Maine as well. I know some of you, if you go back a few episodes, my my maintenance director Will Taylor, who's also a partner in my in our day-to-day senior care camper getaway program. Um he's helping us uh you know finish up uh you know the uh property that we're going to uh have a campground on. I don't care if it's small or large, but it's got to be able to hold at least our 10 RVs because we're going to um we're gonna help out uh seniors that still want to go camping up in Maine. Those that live up in Maine, when our agencies open up there, I want to be able to um integrate uh that program into our uh companion services. So we we have a lot, we have a lot on the horizon, folks. So we're excited. Um, we're open for questions and answers. Um we're open for questions, I mean, so I can give answers. Let's see. Yeah, we got about seven minutes left, folks. Really excited. All right. Um let's see here. Oh, see, I didn't even have to use my script tonight because everything I drafted down here is already done. Yep, so okay, yeah, so that's our time for tonight's open mic, folks. All right, thank you to everyone um who came on uh to watch. Um and again, pick the time. We don't necessarily have to have you on live. We can do a pre-recording and then we can post that event. I I know as I get busier I won't be able to physically do every live stream each week, but we'll we will have some pre-recorded and we'll still run them at the uh at the you know at the time intervals. Um you know, like this one is normally at 7:30. I shouldn't be doing it at this time, so I'm sorry, but I you know I don't want to give up on my commitment to running this every week. And uh so uh yeah, and the Care for Confidence is on uh Tuesdays at 9 a.m. And our Fridays um starting your own senior care business has been running very well too. Actually looking to have some guests that would like to join me, ones that are that have gone past the two-year mark. I'm still in my second year, um, ones that uh went on and and doing what I would love to do someday um in the medical uh agency licensing. So um, yeah. So anyway, yeah, don't forget to subscribe too. Um, so you won't miss out um on these special guests because I'm going to once a month, I'm not gonna inundate people with uh you know, you know, stuff that's not necessary. Our subscribers will get once a month newsletter just so they know what's coming up for the next month. Once I'm not gonna be uh, you know, robo uh calling people and all that kind of stuff. That's not me. Just want to have uh the information for you in a timely fashion going forward. Um, I will post it on my social venues too. You don't have to subscribe, but it'd be nice to have you, folks. Definitely, and thank you again for the 183 subscribers over at uh YouTube channel, our YouTube channel. I love you all. Um, and I'm here for you. I want to give you the information you want. Um, so uh yeah, and uh well until next time, folks. Um take care of yourselves as I will uh as you take care of others. All right, drive safe, stay kind, and we'll see you on the next one. All right, folks. Last uh call for any quick uh comments, helloes, goodbyes, and I'm gonna hit that mark in five seconds. So everybody again, have a great evening. Bye bye.