Care Partners Assisted Living

I was not impressed with my tour of this community. I walked through the community by myself, and nobody stopped me. Nobody approached me till I was leaving the community, and I didn't feel that was right. If I could just walk into the community, that means anybody can. It wasn't the facility for us.

The biggest issue i had with this community was how unhappy and depressed all of the residents looked. Nobody was smiling or really having an kind of interaction with each other when i had taken my tour and that is just not the kind of environment I would want my mother to be in.

I am looking to move my 90 year old mother from assisted living into a memory care facility due to her paranoid/dementia getting worse. Friday, 3/30/18 at 10:31 I placed a call to Care Partners and set up an appointment for Monday, 4/2 at 10:00 to visit the Hortonville, Wi facility. I gave them my name and my telephone number and was told at that time that they would see us on Monday. We drove 1-1/2 hrs from the south side of Milwaukee to keep this appt. Upon arrival (approx. 10:05) we were greeted at the front door by the receptionist who stated that she would be the one to show us around since the coordinator did not have time to talk to us. ?? I thought we had an appt. I wanted prices, etc. How am I to decide what to do with my mother if they can't take a few mins. to talk to us. I was told in no uncertain words that I would have to make another appt. ?? What don't I get?? Evidently this facility even though its new needs a new leader, this one is not working well. If they didn't have time to see us why didn't they call me and let us know so we could change the day instead they would let us drive all that way. I'm sure by now you've figured out that I would never send my mom here and I will never recommend this facility to any others.

Wouldn't recommend......... Dishes aren't properly washed just sanitized. I wouldn't recommend to anyone staff are lazy!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My husband had been in assisted living for 3 months when they watched him walk out the door and not come back. He had dementia as well as other medical issues. They did not put out a silver alert for him or even look for him till after 10 pm, 5 hours after he was seen leaving. They called me at 10 pm and asked when I was bringing him back. I was horrifief! I never took him. out that day at all. they found him next morning dead across the street. The police never came looking till morning. When my hmo person was there trying find out what was going on. I would not trust another living being there. Lack of staff response and lies told by administrator.

This facility is a mess right now. My mother has lived there for more than 4 years, and their care has continued to get worse each year, while the price continues to rise faster than inflation. The facility is run somewhat like a hotel. What this means is that the building *looks* nice. The food is good, and the cosmetic details are well-attended. This gives the impression of a properly-managed assisted living facility. Unfortunately, the aspect that makes the largest difference to seniors with dementia is the actual care, and in this area, they are failing badly. The facility is properly staffed. They'll advertise their staff-to-resident ratio, which is indeed good. What they won't tell you is that in their memory care area, caregivers are given tasks (kitchen/laundry) that are often delegated to non-caregiver staff at other facilities, reducing the time caregivers have to provide actual care. The reason for the extra duties is that the memory care area is physically isolated (3rd floor, secured, one slow elevator). What this also has meant is minimal attention from management. The facility's executive director has an office on the first floor. She rarely ventures up to the memory care area, and when she does, it's to attend to flowers/decorations/other purely cosmetic details that the residents are completely unaware of. The caregivers operate with virtually no supervision. There is essentially no coaching or hands-on training done by the better staff members, or "leads". Anytime I pass instructions to a staff member regarding my mother, I need to personally repeat those instructions to all the other staff who work with mom. After dinnertime, I'll routinely arrive at the facility to find a living room full of residents, with all staff playing on their smartphones, ignoring the residents. The protocol is to check residents for "changing" every 2 hours, but that just isn't followed. They're in the bad habit of opening windows to mask the smell of incontinent residents. They do this even during the dead of winter, with residents just a couple feet away from open windows. Anyone familiar with senior care knows how easily they get cold, especially once they're wheelchair-bound and become inactive. In my time there, I've had to do everything from explaining how to sit Mom in a chair to avoid ruining her posture, to how to avoid putting too much lotion on her face so it doesn't get in her eyes, causing her to tear up, to how to properly change my mother's incontinence products. I've literally had to talk with the caregivers' manager about staff not understanding that they need to wipe residents "front to back". This problem wasn't only occurring with male staff members; it was female staff, too. Other staff members I've needed to coach through putting on Mom's diaper so it wouldn't fall off. These are all things you'd expect proficiency in from someone you hired as an hourly babysitter. Worse yet, I've had a continual struggle getting the facility to respect medical instructions given regarding my mother (note: I'm the next-of-kin, only child, full DPOA & healthcare proxy documentation). My mother has a pre-existing seizure disorder, for which there is no medical remedy. She's been to the hospital before, but has always returned to normal by the time she even gets there. At one point in the past, she picked up an infection in the hospital she didn't have when she went there. I've instructed the facility not to call paramedics for seizures, and instead call me. They haven't stuck to any set protocol. When paramedics are called, I'm never allowed to speak with them directly (e.g. because they call me too late). The staff continues to be ignorant of my mom's condition, despite me doing everything from explaining the history to their nurses, to even providing a smartphone video showing what mom looks like during a (past) seizure. Yet, when the EMTs arrive, the staff are unable, or not articulate enough to communicate adequately with EMTs, who are left in the dark about Mom's normal state. The facility has repeatedly taken down or moved my doctor-signed POLST form that I put on Mom's door explaining that she does not want to be hospitalized for seizures. I've also had problems in the past, both with the facility wanting to give Mom a medication that I told them not to give her, and in another case, taking her off an existing medication, consulting with her doctor directly, and not me. Needless to say, I had previously told them that I want to be in the loop for all such decisions. Their nurses have time and time again gotten in the way of providing Mom good care, rather than helping improve her care. When it came time to get Mom a wheelchair, the facility nurses dragged their feet at every step, requiring me to push them during every transfer of information between them, and the doctor or physical therapist that shows up at the facility to see residents. They simply got in the way. It took 7 weeks to process the wheelchair application, while Mom was in an unstable state, at risk for a fall at any time. This was *not* a delay on the part of Medicare (CMS). I saw the forms. What Medicare asked for in documentation was very basic. During last summer, the facility found bedbugs in multiple rooms on Mom's floor. The management kept the finding quiet (from family members), until it became clear that what was happening with my mother (red spots on her skin) was likely bedbugs, and we needed to exterminate. 2 or 3 months, my mom was bitten on almost a daily basis. Totally unnecessary, the facility just wanted to avoid the appearance of a big problem. At another time last summer, another resident (with a physical problem limiting her mobility) fell in the hallway. I arrived to have lunch with my mom, and found the resident lying in an awkward position in the hallway. I asked staff if they knew, and they said they were aware, but the resident had declined help. While that sometimes happens, I went over to the resident, who was crying and repeatedly calling for help. I asked if she wanted some water, she said yes, and I brought her some. She immediately calmed down. I loosened the brace that she wears on her lower leg, which was digging into her calf in what looked like a painful way. I had to go attend to my own mother, and after a few minutes, the fallen resident again began to call out for assistance. The staff continued to leave her there alone for another half-hour. They didn't even lift her up onto a chair, or some other way to ensure she wasn't twisted up on the floor with her weight pressing on only one arm. A couple years ago, a complaint brought to the attention of the management resulted in a closed-door meeting between myself and nearly all "managers" at the facility (despite me only requesting a meeting with the director and head nurse). At the meeting, the director either suffered a serious lapse of memory, or lied to me outright about her handling of the latest seizure. After I threatened to file a complaint with DSHS, and make public my complaints (like this) the company's representative from corporate HQ contacted me to tell me they had filed a complaint about *me* "disrupting" their facility. I have little doubt that this review will bring similar retaliation, but at some point, I have to try to keep other families from the same fate, and perhaps spur the facility to re-evaluate the way they do business. This is a systemic problem that doesn't go away with family silence.

This seemed like a lovely community and the staff seemed attentive. Recently, however there was an incident that I must report in order to warn of my worry for the safety at Sunrise. A friend of mine, who has been here for a few months, was recently attacked and hit by another patient. He could not defend himself because he is in a wheel chair. The man who hit my friend is remaining in the facility and so my friend is having to leave. I am very disappointed and would not recommend this facility.

Very poorly managed. Care Staff is very rude to residents and families. While the building is very nice and spacious, it does not make up for the poor quality of care.

We are writing this review so that others looking for assisted living facilities for their patents can have the following information. It is our opinion that this facility is not what it once was…. Our parent went from an extremely healthy, mobile individual to a person who could not hold their head up and could not walk a few steps and therefore was in a wheelchair in a matter of weeks. It turns out this was completely unnecessary and could have been avoided. It turns out that Sunrise Mercer Island had been crushing extended release beta blockers twice a day for over 30 days when those beta blocker pills were CLEARLY labeled DO NOT CRUSH. Note: By crushing extended release drugs the patient is receiving a large amount of that drug right away instead of the drug being evenly distributed in their body over the next 12 hours. We feel there is a direct correlation between our parent’s rapid decline and the mishandling of this prescription medication. After the new Executive Director said to us that she was very sorry for what has happened to our parent, she said "By the way we will also need to increase your parent's care cost." Another example of this facility not being what It used to be....Upon visiting our parent and seeing that our parent looked 20 pounds heavier than they did four days earlier and our parent was mumbling and unable to speak clearly, I went into the nurses office and said that there is something very wrong with our parent. I asked, "Is this what happens when they are about to die?" The response I got from the nursing staff was “It’s in God’s hands we cannot know when it is their time” I said I know that .... but something is very wrong with our parent. The next response was “They looked fine this morning and after all they are in the 90’s” Unwilling to just wait and see what happens (as Sunrise was willing to do) I called the doctor and the doctor said to bring our parent in right away. I did so and the doctor diagnosed our parent with a Urinary Tract Infection (UTI). Our parent's doctor told us that ... if we had not called and gotten our parent in right away, the UTI could have turned into sepsis (btw death happens rapidly with sepsis). When I returned from the doctor and told the Sunrise nursing staff "it is not that our parent is in their 90's, it is an urinary tract infection (uti)." The Sunrise Mercer Island nurses looked at one another and said "oh another one" It is our opinion that the UTI was caused by the Sunrise care staff not giving our parent a shower for over 2 weeks. We were UNAWARE of this (we were led to believe showers were given 2 times a week and if the resident declined the shower then family would surely be notified). We feel these were completely unnecessary and traumatic experiences for our parent and we feel that others should be made aware of these situations. These are our experiences and our opinions of Sunrise Mercer Island. Reviewed February 2018

My mother was a resident of Care Partners on French road. During the 8 months that she resided there, there were 3 managerial changes, staff came and went on a weekly basis. Simple, basic every day needs were not met, depends were not even changed every day! This facility is beautiful, but it is severely understaffed, and the staff is not trained to handle dementia patients.

My father was here. He wasn't showered for eight days. Medication errors. He vomited in bed and bedding wasn't changed even four days later. Staff [Removed] our family. I have read the guidelines.

The Country Terrace in Stanley has less than optimal care for the residents. Director is the most uncaring person along with most of the rest of the staff. No activities, no resident interaction, no snacks offered even though this us what is told when you move your loved one in there. Workers spend more time on checking cell phone and on smoke breaks than taking care of residents. I would not recommend this place to any family considering putting there loved one at this assisted living.

Please do not leave your loved one here. Do not let the new building fool you...keep looking. Staff not properly trained, staff over worked and complaining. Of course there were a few staff members that cared and were good employees, but not many. Many times there were 1-2 staff on shift that could not dispense medication! Our loved one had to wait until next shift to receive pain mediation! Actually found staff sleeping during work hours at different times! Families were not told of negative events of loved ones that took place while they were gone, that were witnessed by other family members of other residents. Staff had left the building unattended at times, and I could go on and on!! Please take my word for it and keep touring other facilities. You do not want our loved one here. After removing our family member we found out other terrible things from previous staff and other families that were familiar with owners reputation of sweeping things under the rug. Wherever you leave your loved one, you have to visit often and not take anything for granted. It is hard enough moving them into such a facility, but you want to know they are safe and well cared for. Talk to other family members before making your decisions. You can look at this facilities public records to see their violations of state codes.

The caregivers are really good and i am impressed and feel welcome.However,i have had encounters with a member of the management which left me with questions more than answers.She seemed to know nothing yet she was incharge of the care provision.Disapointed!