On Christmas Eve my husband received a phone call from the administrator at the Memory Care Unit where his brother resided. She stated she would be discharging him to the ER of the hospital for a phyc evaluation and would not be allowing him to return due to behaviors.
BIL had only been a this facility for a month and we were never made aware of any current issues. We visited 3 or 4 times and no one said anything to use about any problems. Therefore, we thought all was well.
BIL at some behaviors in the past that had been attended to. At the time BIL was 4 hours away and we just could not be a part of the care team like we wished. Husband and I thought if we could get him closer to home, we could be more involved with him and his care plans. Thinking if there were anything else to arise, we could assist in what the problem was and how it could be resolved. So long to our hopeful thinking.
Long story short … We received the phone call from the social worker today that BIL is ready to be released but that administrator said she already told us he could not return. Social Worker asked us, What are our plans. I informed her that the administrator can not discharge him without a 30 day notice. SW stated she would contact administrator and call us back We never heard anything.
Is this situation illegal? Any advice would be appreciated.
Memory Care Units claim they can handle the behavior issues when indeed most can not.
Oh my goodness. Your dad's situation and my BIL is almost exactly the same. He too has alz. and I saw where they try to put szh on his paperwork and my husband said he was never diagnosed with that.
You are exactly right. They do try to create a monster out of them and try to claim they have mental illness when they can not get meds to regulate the behaviors.
You are on point. I have been telling my husband all along that I feel like my BIL is only trying to defend himself not having true perception. Yet, they want to call my husband so angry and act like he is some animal. They are supposed to be loving and caring yet they dump him in a hospital and leave them there. What is wrong with these people?
If I could, I would snatch him out of their so fast and he would never go back in a facility. They do not care. Society will throw a label on you so fast that you can scrub off. Pure ridiculous. Once again, I am so sorry what you and your dad has been through.
Oh, I forgot to mention. My BIL was like your dad. Before alz took over, he was like a genious, extremely smart and reserved. Thanks dear for replying.
My final thoughts as I would like to try and help you but I continue to be left scratching my head with your responses every time someone tries to explain how things work
- if you are in the US, you or hubs need a HIPPA release or medical POA to discuss BIL with health care providers
- please stop expecting others - the facilities - to solve the problem
I get no one wants to get involved but it takes great effort to make anything better in this situation - I know this first hand - my mother's dementia has turned her into someone I didn't know and I fought for her in order not to have her memory care facility send her out on a psych hold - how did I fight ?
I control her care - I take her to outside doctors including a neurologist and discuss med options and research the options -
this takes time and effort which you and hubs are not likely to have but the alternative is her facility would rather use their house doctor and suggest meds that will cause her to sleep all day -
there are few options for dementia with aggressive behavior
it does not matter that BIL used to be a good decent person - he now has a disease which manifests in psychosis - his brain is broken and no amount of sweet talk from staff is going to fix it or suddenly make him cooperative
we all agree that the situation is awful, care is lacking and resources are limited but if you are able please spend a bit of time today to write down three things you can do on Monday to help move the situation forward
I would guess that a lot of BIL's problems are a lack of consistent medical providers - is he bounced from facility to facility without a doctor knowing him and constantly having his meds changed ?
I'll offer up a start
- contact psych hospital social worker and ask what is protocol for diagnosis and follow up care plan and who will be providing that care - does BIL need a referral to psychiatrist or internist and will this care provider work with him in a facility ?
I am sticking to what you said. Thanks for you help.
At least the administrator at the other facility had enough sense to know she could not just drop him off to the hospital. She thought she could discharge him to my husband in 30 days. After I picked up the phone and made a phone call, that story changed right quick.
During the transitions, I asked the DON to contact me every day or so (phone call or email) at _her_ convenience to let me know how Dad was doing and if there was anything I needed to do for Dad. One of the benefits of the extra transitional care was a daily report was written and the DON forwarded those to me.
I didn't try to tell the MC how to operate. When there were issues I asked what our options were. We always found something we thought would work out better, sometimes those ideas worked and sometimes we had to try again. When the plan wasn't followed as agreed, I asked about my misunderstanding of the action plan instead of starting with a confrontation. I completely understand your frustration and anger and the desire to confront the people who haven't met your expectations, but you really do need to remember "you can catch more flies with sugar than vinegar". Please try to stop being so critical of the MC, it's staff, and it's actions and try to find some way to work _with_ the MC, maybe especially when something is messed up. Often there no way to "unspill" the milk but sometimes people really appreciate someone who helps them clean up the mess without first bringing undue attention to their fault in the spill. "I don't understand how..." is often a good conversation starter.
Ask what conditions the MC would need met to reinstate BIL. Read his contract and be ready to use ask about any conflict resolution or eviction language you feel would be helpful to BIL's case, but be nice.
I am not trying to blame the staff or facility. All I am trying to say is ..... Why did the staff and administrator keep telling my husband and I everything was going well if it was not? Maybe if they had been honest with my husband he could have offer advice on handling the situation. That is not what happened though.
Once again, I appreciate you advice. By the way, I already have a geatric case manager involved, so hopefully they can steer things in the right direction.
Not once, have you ever tried to offer some type of encouragement. All you ever got to say is …. What I can not do. Did I not already prove you wrong when you kept jumping on here saying I had no authority so I could not get him moved closer to home but I did.
Are you so bitter is all you can do is try to offer lost hope?
Furthermore, you have absolutely no compassion for no one. And to come on my profile and send me a private message calling me a TROLL ……. You need to troll on.
If you are going to post anything about my BIL you need to get your FACTS straight. He does NOT have a GUARDIAN.
You seem to have a BIG problem with me going on with this for such a LONG time. (3-4 years) You don't understand it do you? Let me break it down for you. I am a F I G H T E R when it comes to something like this. Since you COMPLAIN so much about me going through this for so long, what do you think I should do GIVE UP? Obviously so, you called me a TROLL.