No matter the timing, placing a parent in a senior living community is never an easy decision to make. Due to medical difficulties or the stress from caring for a parent at home, a senior living community is often a kind and necessary change to ensure that your parents continue to thrive in an engaging environment while also remaining safe and healthy.
Finding a home away from home, and ensuring their well-being is prioritized is an important step to placing a parent. Choosing a new community for your parents is a difficult choice, so here are the key steps to make the process of placement in a senior living community a bit easier!
Analyze Your Parent’s Needs
First and foremost, you must determine your parent’s day-to-day needs outside of a long-term care community. Analyze if they need assistance with activities of daily living, such as eating, getting dressed, walking, personal hygiene, bladder control, etc. Some instrumental activities of daily living include meal preparation, medication management, and daily personal care.
Assessing if your parent needs an elevated level of medical care can also help you determine what type of senior living community you should choose. Some long-term care communities specialize in skilled nursing while others focus on memory care, which caters to those with Alzheimer’s or dementia.
Make a list of daily items your parent or loved one needs assistance with. Determine the level of cognitive assistance you provide at home, and be communicative with communities on how much or little care your parent needs throughout the day.
Determine Your Budget
The next step is outlining the budget that you have for senior living. Coverage programs such as Medicare and Medicaid may offer support with short-term nursing care, but finding coverage through these programs for long-term care communities is sometimes difficult. With that being said, there is always a possibility your parent opted into a long-term care insurance policy that can cover their stay in a senior living facility. Check with their medical insurance company to find out possible policy information.
Veterans benefits are another way to offset the costs of senior living. Veterans benefits not only apply to the Veteran but also the surviving spouse of the wartime veteran. These benefits have to be awarded through the Veteran Support Center of Michigan, and they are applied for eligible individuals based on income, assets, and care costs.
It is important that you look into all related factors, assess your parents’ available finances, and determine the reliability of available coverage. This ensures that if you need to dig into your savings or other assets, you are ready to make the arrangements without getting surprised by the requirements.
Begin Searching for Nearby Facilities
After gathering your findings regarding your parent’s medical requirements and budget, you can look into the right type of senior living communities. Depending on distance, availability of rooms, and tour options you can make an educated decision on placement.
This planned approach makes it easier for you to schedule tour visits before selecting the facility. It also simplifies any ongoing meetings you may have once your parent moves into the senior living facility. The moving process can be stressful but deciding on a senior care community that meets your needs is important.
Use the internet to narrow down options nearest you. Make sure the assisted or independent living community has options for continued care such as intermediate or memory care. Decipher whether or not your method of payment is accepted at the facility (i.e. medicare, Medicaid, private pay).
Make sure the facility you select is within suitable distance and has on-site solutions serving your parent’s needs. In some cases, you might need to prioritize care over distance, but in all cases make sure the community meets both your personal and necessary wants and needs.
Reach Out to Shortlisted Options
Once you have decided on qualifying factors for your ideal senior living community and shortlisted a few facilities, you can move forward with contacting them for tours and pricing information. Apart from having a detailed consultation over the phone, you can also schedule an in-person tour.
These tours allow you to see the facility up-close and observe its security, safety, and service measures in real-time. From checking life enrichment activities to determining meal quality in-person tours are hard to beat. In some cases you may get to interact with current residents and talk to managerial staff about what to expect during move-in.
If your parents are cognitively aware and positive about the upcoming changes, bringing them on the tours may be a great way to determine a potential match. This ensures that they are happy with the facility you choose together and comfortable with the changes.
Once you have decided on the facility that checks all the boxes on the list, you can then comfortably move forward with placing them into their new home! Make sure to help them throughout the transition, and continue to keep in touch with each other via phone calls, video calls, as well as in-person visits.
Contact Our Michigan Senior Living Community
Vicinia Gardens is a community-based long-term living facility with campuses on both the east and west sides of lower Michigan. We understand that transitioning a parent into an assisted living facility can have a big impact on both their life and yours. At Vicinia Gardens, we do all we can to ensure your loved one is able to live their golden years to the fullest. Our state-of-the-art facilities, compassionate care measures, and highly qualified staff make for an ideal living environment for seniors. With multiple care options, you can easily find something that fulfills all your requirements on our campus.
Reach out to us to learn more about our senior living communities in Fenton and Otsego!
