After watching countless 2000s movies about girls who hate their mothers, a pattern I’ve noticed is that the girl often threatens to put her mother into a nursing home. Honestly, it’s called for most of the time. But why are nursing homes portrayed as such nightmares? It’s because they are. Initiatives must be implemented to improve the quality of life that nursing homes provide, and this starts with increasing funding and decreasing the stigma surrounding them.
In reality, many residents of nursing homes have no other option for their living situation. When someone is suffering from dementia, has no family, or is reaching the end of their life, they may spend the rest of their days depending on others for their activities of daily living. However, the turnover rate of nursing assistants — those who assist with ADLs and spend the most time with residents — is over 40 percent. Honestly, this rate is not surprising. With low wages, high stress, understaffing issues, and great physical demands, it is a grueling job.
I worked as a nursing assistant for Welcome Nursing Home throughout my sophomore year at Oberlin, and it was a rewarding but tough experience. As a pre-medical student, I wanted to gain experience with patient interactions, and Welcome Nursing Home provided the perfect opportunity given that it is just a 30-minute walk from campus. I had the responsibility of helping residents with ADLs (bathing, grooming, toileting, eating), lifting and moving residents, taking vital signs, communicating with the healthcare team and family members, and providing companionship and friendship to the residents. Although it wasn’t glamorous, I was honored to be able to help residents in this way. But at the end of each shift, I was exhausted, both physically and mentally.
A big part of this was constant employee call-offs. Welcome Nursing Home already appeared to be understaffed with nursing assistants, and employees calling off every weekend made the workload much greater and barely tolerable for others scheduled for that shift. There were times when I was with just two other nursing assistants for the entire wing, each of us looking after nearly 20 residents. When you are trying to get everyone awake, bathed, groomed, and fed for the morning, how can you possibly devote adequate attention and care to each resident? You can’t.
Understaffing is not only stressful for the nursing team — it results in poor, inadequate care for residents. One common result of this was that residents would commonly suffer from pressure ulcers. Many residents are unable to turn over and adjust their posture on their own and require being turned over every two hours in order to prevent pressure ulcers. Of course, this was not the reality. Once formed, such wounds risked becoming infected, increasing residents’ suffering and the workload for the care team. It was a downward spiral.
Why, then, were there so many call-offs and so much understaffing? For one, nursing assistants are not paid nearly enough. When I was working, I made $15.50 an hour. I get that we are in Ohio, where the minimum wage is $10.70, but I was making much more and doing much less as a barista during my senior year of high school. If drawing hearts on lattes and making small talk with customers can get you upwards of $20 an hour after tips, shouldn’t essential healthcare workers make just as much, if not more? Most of my coworkers at Welcome Nursing Home were single mothers and some of the most hardworking people I have ever met. They were severely underpaid for the amount of work and care that they were putting in.
Although the job took an emotional and mental toll on me, the reason that I stopped working as a nursing assistant after just one year was the physical toll it took on my body. I was constantly sore and aching due to how rushed I was trying to lift one patient, transfer another, and bathe yet another in the span of half an hour.
Throughout all of this, my biggest regret was not being able to get to know the residents more. I would chat with whoever wanted to while I was performing care on them, but I would seldom have extra time just to sit and have a conversation. While there were staff who held activities throughout the week, many residents who could not make it to the activities missed out. Whether it was not feeling like socializing or being too physically tired to get out of bed, these residents were unable to fulfill a vital part of their mental and emotional health.
A high percentage of nursing home residents suffer from depressive symptoms, with one study finding that 30 percent suffer from depression each year. Incorporating time for socializing and activities into a resident’s care plan is essential for battling this issue. To do this, nursing homes must receive more funding to hire more staff and raise pay to increase retention rates.
Another way to combat this is by getting volunteers to provide companionship to the residents. During the few instances in which I had time to sit down and talk with residents or do a coloring book with them, I noticed their moods visibly improve. If you have the freedom in your schedule to dedicate an hour or two a week to spending time with a resident, I urge you to take action. One conversation can have a powerful impact for those who have spent the past decade bedridden.
Nursing home residents and the nursing assistants that care for them are both in positions lacking power. In order to provide the best care and quality of life, wages must be raised, staffing must be increased, and the conversation must start now.
