Calgary Journal Online

Senior better off after approving family suggestions to move to an assisted living residence

Margaret Brodylo left her small family farm to move to an assisted residence where she enjoys living.

Photo: Claudia Noriega/Calgary Journal

“I came as if I was going to be here for two weeks,” Brodylo said, noting that she took only a few garments and personal hygienic belongings and left everything else behind at home. “I wore black a lot. I once had a heart attack while in my sleep so my daughter and family decided that I should move here.”

In his study “When to Put a Parent in Assisted Living or a Nursing Home”, Elliot S. Levy points out that the present generation has a difficult task in deciding how and where a parent is going to live. Children of the elderly face questions like, what is available? and what are the costs? Perhaps the most compelling question is what will be the emotional and psychological implications of the decision?

Levy indicates that family members need to be as supportive as possible. Sometimes an elderly doesn’t accept or realize his or her changing abilities, because it can be depressing.

“I do miss watching the stars and the clear blue sky,” Brodylo said on her life in the farm. “I used to subscribe to a magazine called Stars and Telescope, or something like that, and my son and I bought a telescope together and we put it in the upstairs of the garage, and it was so great just looking at the moon.”

Levy continues saying that senior's family members might have to look for trusted professionals to assist in making the decision. The family doctor may help and close relatives may have to connect with other health care professionals such as occupational and physical therapists, social workers or psychologists. Seniors usually give their children the legal power to make the choice of their arrangements for assisted living, but there are instances where seniors are totally against leaving their own homes.

Sandy Tut,  a former worker for an assisted living residence and now working for a seniors' physician, remembers the environment involved in an assisted living residence.

“Many senior patients come up here, to the front desk, and start telling me all about their feelings and worries on moving to an assisted residence,” said Tut. “There was this senior lady who was living alone and came here every time to talk about whether to move or not, but she was talking to me in a different way than she would talk to her family members. She looked for other people, not just relatives or doctors, to reassure her that all together were making the right decision.”

“In the end, seniors are grateful to be advised to move to an assisted residence,” Tut said. “They have activities to do, they eat together, they chat together, and eventually, they create their own lively community.”

Dr. P.A . Mitha, a family doctor that has been working with seniors for decades, said he has seen patients become "very apprehensive in the beginning when they move to an assisted-living situation because they do not know what to expect."

“But once they get settled they feel much happier, because of the structured environment," Mitha said. "They get physiotherapy, occupational therapy, doctor's assistance and they get their meals on time.”

Mitha, who praised the value of the care provided by assisted living residences in Calgary, said seniors’ well-being can improve after they settle in to an assisted living situation, because they make new friends and benefit from the positive psychological and physical environment.  Mitha believes that the best age to move to an assisted living residence is over  70, but also agrees that age can be relative depending on the abilities of each senior.

“Everything is good here,” Brodylo said. “The personnel amaze me, they are so wonderful, they are delightful, they are very qualified. I do have a worker who takes me out twice a week and sometimes we go out to the farm just to see what is going on there, and I love to see the beautiful mountain sky.”