Experience
Safety
The safety and well-being of your loved one is always paramount. Our professional and supervisory staff provide ongoing training and monitoring. Necessary to ensure your loved one’s health, happiness, and well-being in all environments.
Our medical, professional, and personal care staff are diligent and organized , and in proper supply at all times. In the event of any emergency, ranging from an individual medical crisis to a citywide weather-related evacuation, we have a written plan ready to be put into action at any time, and all of our staff are trained and prepared. We are fully staffed at all times, and frequently provide additional staff in special situations where it might be optimal for people with more advanced needs.
Our supervisors complete home and vehicle inspections daily, and at a varied times, using a combination of specific safety checklists and good common sense. Simple issues are corrected on the spot, and more complex problems are addressed expeditiously with guidance from professional teams.
Our registered nurses and medical support staff are on call and immediately available 24/7 to meet any need, ranging from simple questions about medications to serious medical emergencies. Our maintenance specialists, in conjunction with licensed repair specialists, are equally available to diagnose and correct any maintenance problem. Our care supervisors are available to address staff coverage concerns.
Our Program Directors, drawing on years of experience , are available to provide overall guidance to address any problem. And ultimately, our executive leadership team are available 24/7 to provide feedback and direction whenever there is any question that needs additional input, or even to be more directly involved if a situation calls for that.
Friendship
In addition to participating in the life of the community at large, we also strive to maintain our own community between our residents, their family members, and our employees. In each region, we provide a program that functions like an extended family where interpersonal relationships are highly valued.
In a word, friendship becomes the agent that binds people to each other, and to the program as a whole. With patience and encouragement, our staff create opportunities to teach tolerance, model positive social skills, and help boost the self-confidence needed to participate in both one-on-one friendships between individuals, as well as between groups of individuals. With this pro-social approach to caregiving role-modeling, such friendships ultimately help people feel overcome stigmas and feel as confident as anyone without disability.
Personal Care Staff
Like the people we serve, our personal care staff are from a variety of places and cultural backgrounds. Yet, our team of caregivers have a common thread of love, compassion, patience, and respect for the people we serve. We strive to hire and retain those caregivers who excel in areas that are hard to quantify, but still easy to see…a special approach in their interactions that promotes self-esteem and positive feelings, while still maintaining ultimate order in an environment that could otherwise be chaotic.
It comes down to understanding each person as a unique individual with different interests and personalities, while and understanding their own role as support staff who must keep the activity on a scheduled routine without seeming like correctional officers.
Of course, each of our prospective employees receive thorough background checks (including criminal, abuse/neglect registry, driving history, and special fraud registries), and we also obtain past employment references before any prospective employee is even considered. But only through careful interviewing, touring of facilities, and sometimes even meeting with facility members are we able to determine the core of the person we want to select to work with your loved one.
That “core” is not necessarily present in everyone and is not always easy to spot. But we know it when we see it, and those are the people we strive to hire…people who have a passion for caregiving , and for whom this work is more than a means to a paycheck.
Diversity
Every person is different, and we are mindful of those differences in everything we do. In addition to unique hobbies and related interests, we serve individuals diverse in medical, dietary, and personal care needs. Only by being fully aware of every unique need can our team of personal care and professional staff properly support an individual. This awareness starts with getting to know family members and friends and developing active and ongoing communication to fully understand what’s uniquely important to everyone . Only once that communication is established, can we begin to develop effective plans of care for your loved one. Our expertise alone is not sufficient; we have to collaborate and never presume to know what we truly don’t.
We also celebrate differences and honor traditions. From religious activities and holidays, to cultural events and basic individual self-expression, each person’s goals and passions are nurtured without judgement. And if a personal goal is not realistic, we help an individual to develop a similar goal that is. We employ bilingual and multilingual staff to support our residents and guardians from a variety of ethnicities and backgrounds. Food and entertainment preferences are honored, and somehow everyone seems to enjoy each other’s traditions without losing their own sense of identity.