Monday, December 7, 2009
Final Thoughts On LTC
This class has definitely changed my perspective on Long Term Care, before I thought of Long Term care as Nursing homes and retirement, now I know that it has much more meaning to it. I never saw myself being interested in LTC for my career, but learning more about it has changed my views. Knowing that I could do so many things in LTC makes me very interested in it as a career possibility. This class showed me many different classes of LTC and it made so many options available for me to think about with my future, my parent’s future, and the future of the people I love most. I have learned what long term cares true meaning is, the origin of long term care, the types of long term care facilities, how long term care is funded, different consumers of long term care, different job titles working in long term care, and much more. Long term care is very important in today’s society and will only continue to grow. With the increase in medicine and technology people are living longer lives and finding many ways to defeat death. The uses of long term care will expand tremendously with the increasing population. I have enjoyed this class very much; the teacher, the classmates, the lessons, and the debates. I know that the knowledge that I will take from this class will be put to use not only with my career but for the help of family and friends.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
End of life decisions & Ethics in LTC
With the final debate coming up tomorrow, I figured it would be a good discussion to get me thinking about it. The pro team will be backing up healthcare providers and that end of life decisions should be decided by them and not the patient. The con team, on the other hand, backs up the decisions made by the patients and not the providers. The pro team has a lot of reason to argue that the decision should be made by the healthcare provider, after all, the healthcare provider is the one trained to handle such matters. They should know the ins and outs of the medical treatment received and educate their patients on such decisions. Most doctors are going to decide to do whatever it is that they can do to keep their patient alive, but what about the patients feelings? He/she is the one fighting to hard to hold on to their life and isn’t there a time when you would feel like you just don’t want to fight anymore. The doctor has so much weighing on their shoulders on what happens to each and every patient. What if the procedure works, not to mention saving a life, they received credit and money? I think that healthcare providers to take everything else into consideration besides just the life of the patient. The patient may also have tons of thoughts running through their mind as well, such as family and income. It is emotional stressful for a patient to have to think of these things but I believe that once they have fought for these things so long that there is a time to let go. Since we are talking about long term care for example the healthcare providers believes that a nursing home would be suitable for a woman’s husband, but neither the woman nor her husband would like him to go into a nursing home. The woman is elderly as well and cannot take care of her husband like she used too. The doctor has to take many things into consideration such as the autonomy of the patient, informed consent, living will, durable power of attorney, and so on. When does it end? The doctor is also looking out for the well being of the woman, other options should be discussed and there should be some kind of compromise on the decision. In my opinion all cases should be up to the patient, unless they are incapable and do not have a durable power of attorney to make the decision for them. .If I was terminally ill and have been fight for a long time and wanted to participate in physicians assisted suicide, I believe it is my decision to do so. Many decisions have to be made in healthcare and they are very controversial decisions, I am very thankful that we have rules and regulations to help us make these decisions. I use healthcare as guidance, education, and help with the decisions I need to make in my life.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Royal Oaks Nursing and Rehab Center
I have been to many long term care facilities, mainly of a Nursing Home nature. I participated in the CNA program in high school and traveled to many nursing home facilities. I decided to focus my blog on Royal Oaks Nursing and Rehab Center located in Titusville, Fl. I have visited this Nursing Home numerous times and have many friends that work there as CNA's. Its really hard to point out the differences in this Nursing Home opposed to others. Most nursing homes like Royal Oak have many similarities such as sick old people in bed, is pretty much the way I see it. When I think of a nursing home I think of a sad elderly person sitting in a wheel chair, just look for attention from the medical staff. My overall outlook on nursing homes is pretty sad. I know that I would never want to send my parents to one. Its really hard for me to explain my feelings on this matter, I just feel sadness when I walked through the doors of Royal Oaks, regardless of how nice the facility is. The people there might be getting the care they need as well but it always seems like they need more, like they need attention, like they need meds, like they need a bath. I do believe that Royal Oaks Nursing facility is a little under staffed the people seemed like they needed more attention then what they were receiving. I just think that CNA's should get paid a little bit more to do what they do. They do everything! They are spending every last minute they have with these people and work pretty hard to see they are getting the treatment they need (in most cases), some CNA's dont take the time to properly care for their patients I dont know if it is because they just dont care, dont have enough time, or dont think they should take the time because of there pay, but whatever the excuse they may use, those people deserve more. When I was there, maybe timing was wrong, but I didnt see many activities going on, and not to much action. I mainly saw everyone in there beds around two people to a room, not so lively. Nursing Homes to me are just sad and I dont want to see myself in the position to have to be in one or anyone that I love. I believe in other alternatives as opposed to putting family in a nursing home. I would take the responsibility to take in my parents during their last years rather then putting them in a home, were in my opinion they pretty much rot and wait to die off.(Ruthless expression)
Monday, September 7, 2009
Physical/Chemical Restraints in LTC
With the first debate right around the corner, I believe the subject of the debate would be a good one to start thinking about and discussing. The debate will be about if the use of chemical or physical restraints in Long Term Care facilities is acceptable or unacceptable. My opinion would vary case by case and depend on the situation the patient or their caretaker were in. If the patient was in a position to harm themself or anyone around them I would say it is acceptable, some patients in there mental condition need a little help to calm down. Ensuring patients physical safety is number one and if you can do this by using restraints I would say it is okay. I do believe that physical restraints should not be able to be choice of caretakers or nurses but should be taken to higher authority such as doctors approval first.
Other instances when it us used for discipline or at the caretakers convenience because they are lazy or fed up with dealing with the patients and they use chemical/physical restraints instead of taking their time to use other sources that are available such as words to see what is needed, it is highly unacceptable in those matters. Believe it or not there are alot of cases of abuse going on in Long Term Care facilities and this is the cause of many of them.
Although the use of restraints have decreased becuase of the Nursing Home Reform Act, 200 patients still die each year due to the use of restraints. Caretakers are being lazy and not taking the time to care for their patients. You have to have a big heart and care alot about people to do what they do and the people who cannot handle it should not be in the field. Overall I believe restraint are acceptable if people within the facility are using an ethical code of conduct by doing so.
Soures:
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.nursinghomeabuseresourcecenter.com/injured/restraints/images/i_photo.gif&imgrefurl=http://www.nursinghomeabuseresourcecenter.com/injured/restraints/index.html&usg=__xd_GVSoc8f-cJ0iOI7eIEqh-Ed8=&h=141&w=162&sz=20&hl=en&start=8&sig2=vy7NBvir-d5mgqphUo8xug&um=1&tbnid=qhXE7fyPgpcR4M:&tbnh=85&tbnw=98&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dchemical%2Brestraints%26hl%3Den%26um%3D1&ei=kM-lSvO8B8iztgedqsybBQ
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.ohiobarrister.com/images/restraint.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.ohiobarrister.com/nursing%2520home%2520rights.htm&usg=__WJQK6oVht3nqQZE6XXeh2KaIGWk=&h=330&w=450&sz=26&hl=en&start=5&sig2=sQF7Y_zQM6EKUob-ihgUJg&um=1&tbnid=H6WTlTjHfN_JKM:&tbnh=93&tbnw=127&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dnursing%2Bhome%2Brestraints%26hl%3Den%26um%3D1&ei=_AinSr6wKabQNIjgnbEP
http://www.allhealthcare.com/nfs/allhealthcare/attachment_images/0003/8260/facility_restraints_crop380w.jpg
Sunday, August 30, 2009
What does LTC mean to you?
Long Term Care can mean a variety of different things, it depends on the person and how they view it. I believe Long Term Care to be a facility or person taking care of someone who is not capable of taking care of there selves. Many people view Long Term Care as taking care of the “elderly”, I would like to think that the elderly were the only ones who would need this type of care, but not necessarily. A person with a certain condition, disability, or illness may need Long Term Care. It doesn’t matter if they are ten years old or thirty years old they could be using long term care just like your grandmother is. Long term care I would think of a person helping someone to do the day to day activities that they cannot do by themselves, an example of these might be eating, bathing, or brushing their own teeth.
I have viewed Long Term Care in this way because I have grown up watching my uncle get taken care of ever since I can remember, and he is now thirty three. He has a condition called Cerebral Palsy, and needs help with all the things an elderly person would need help with. I have watched and still watch my grandmother who is not a young woman struggle to help feed, clothe, and bathe my uncle daily. It makes me sad to watch her on daily basis, thinking to my self she is getting to old for this. What is going to happen when she needs help herself? Long term care is not cheap, if it were to be done through a facility of some sort. My uncle goes to a special school/work everyday to keep him living a halfway normal life and still learning a lot to this gay and I know that it cannot be cheap. I am sure that there is some type of government program that pays for disabilities like this, but not so much for all the elderly. The government only can give so much to the elderly for long term care facilities and it is sad to see that they can’t do more or will not do more.
I think that long term care is an important field to go into and I think it would be interesting as well as needed. I don’t think the need for long term care will decrease anytime soon, if anything it will only rise, due to the increasing elderly population. Hopefully there will be some sort of a result in funding to the increasing elderly population so that the country doesn’t find them selves in some kind of problem in the future. In my opinion, people need to plan for their own retirement and save money, not always think that the government is going to be there to support them.
I have viewed Long Term Care in this way because I have grown up watching my uncle get taken care of ever since I can remember, and he is now thirty three. He has a condition called Cerebral Palsy, and needs help with all the things an elderly person would need help with. I have watched and still watch my grandmother who is not a young woman struggle to help feed, clothe, and bathe my uncle daily. It makes me sad to watch her on daily basis, thinking to my self she is getting to old for this. What is going to happen when she needs help herself? Long term care is not cheap, if it were to be done through a facility of some sort. My uncle goes to a special school/work everyday to keep him living a halfway normal life and still learning a lot to this gay and I know that it cannot be cheap. I am sure that there is some type of government program that pays for disabilities like this, but not so much for all the elderly. The government only can give so much to the elderly for long term care facilities and it is sad to see that they can’t do more or will not do more.
I think that long term care is an important field to go into and I think it would be interesting as well as needed. I don’t think the need for long term care will decrease anytime soon, if anything it will only rise, due to the increasing elderly population. Hopefully there will be some sort of a result in funding to the increasing elderly population so that the country doesn’t find them selves in some kind of problem in the future. In my opinion, people need to plan for their own retirement and save money, not always think that the government is going to be there to support them.
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