Family Caregivers Are Essential!

It is going on six months that residents have gone without their essential family caregiver. Not only has lack of family caused mental decline, depression, and feeling of isolation in many residents, we forget it’s more than that. These essential family caregivers have advocated for the resident, made sure the resident had what they needed or wanted, and helped them with what the nursing home diid’t do.

In March, the families were understanding they could not visit and that the state and nursing homes needed time to find a way to keep the residents safe. They were not happy staffing requirements were taken away, and they were not happy there was not going to be any in-person oversight, but the families believed if they temporarily accepted these changes, it would help save the lives of their loved ones.

Fast forward six months, long-term care facilities have been hit the hardest and have the most deaths in Ohio. We have now lost over 2,000 mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, grandparents and other family members. COVID is not being kept out of the facilities, as it is getting in through staff., nursing homes have no proved to be safe. The families still can’t visit, and there is still no in-person oversite. We are hearing many stories of short staffing, poor care, residents being kept in the rooms for weeks and some for months, and families believing some of these deaths are not COVID, but neglect. There is no willingness to address these issues with the families and there seems to be no more of a plan than there was in March.

Minnesota has acknowledged the importance of essential family caregivers and has come up with a plan to fill this critical need. Ohio should be doing the same. Read about Minnesota’s plan here.