08/16/2024
Have you ever wondered what a privately owned AFC Home offers vs. large facilities? Here are some answers to some common questions that we have been asked as a privately owned AFC home company. (All answers are specific to JSY Elder Care only, not all AFC homes)
Owning and operating AFC (Adult Foster Care) homes is a challenging but extremely rewarding adventure. At JSY Elder Care we take great pride in our mission and continually strive to make our homes a safe and pleasant place for the residents entrusted to our care. We have compiled some of our most common questions that we have been asked in the past whether it was from in person tours and informational phone calls.
Q. Who can live at your home?
A. We are licensed to accommodate elders 60 years and older with disabilities, cognitive decline and many other needs.
Q. Are you qualified to care for my parent?
A. Absolutely, our staff has extensive experience in elder care. Our management team has over 30 years of combined elder care experience in multiple areas such as memory care, total care, daily living care, end of life care, and medication management.
Q. Are you licensed?
A. Yes we are. Our JSY Elder care homes are both State of Michigan licensed and approved. Our homes have gone through extensive licensing and approval inspections by the State of Michigan and have been awarded licenses by the Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs.
Q. What does my elders monthly payment cover.
A. Simply put, pretty much everything. The resident monthly payment covers 24hr. Caregiver care, television, heating/cooling, laundry, medication accountability and distribution, three freshly prepared meals a day (no tv dinners here), assistance with bathing and other personal needs. Resident medical expenses are still paid separately by the resident and family. Often thousands of dollars less per month than larger facilities, our smaller privately owned homes offer a care ratio of one staff for every six residents vs larger facilities that often have ten or more residents to one staff member. Our homes also have management living on site at both locations which often brings the staff to resident ratio to 2:6 and sometimes even 3:6.
Q. How do you entertain the residents?
A. We have many means of entertainment, whether it’s the resident watching their favorite tv shows or playing cards, we do it all. We have weekly bingo (no money involved), dexterity games, chair yoga and many other ways that we keep our residents active and moving.
Q. Do the residents have to participate in activities?
A. Short answer, no. Our residents are not forced to do anything they don’t wish to do in this area. This is their home and they can participate as much or as little as they wish to. We will encourage the residents but never force them to do anything they don’t want to do.
Q. How do your meals work?
A. Each day our staff will prepare a family style meal for the residents at lunch and dinner, breakfast is generally an a la cart style breakfast to accommodate the residents morning routines and wake up times for appointments and so on. These meals are based off of the likes of our residents who help our staff make up their menus every two weeks so they get what they like to eat. We pair the resident meal choices with a food health chart so each resident receives food that they like with the proper nutrition that they need.
Q. Do we accommodate special diets?
A. Absolutely, our staff monitors dietary plans of our residents if needed and all food intake is monitored and logged to actively partner with the residents medical care providers.
Q. Do our staff accompany residents to appointments?
A. We do not transport but can accompany. Due to our insurance company liability regulations, JSY Elder Care does not provide transportation for our residents. We however will coordinate with agencies that do and we also partner with agencies that will come to the home to treat the resident.
Q. Do we as a family have to do the residents laundry?
A. You can if you choose to but we will do all of the residents laundry, fold it and put it away for the resident. As the family or guardian it is your responsibility to purchase clothing for the resident but beyond that we take care of the rest.
Q. How do you ensure the elder doesn’t wonder off?
A. All of our homes have 24hr. staffing and each door at our homes has security alarms that sounds as anyone enters or exits the homes notifying our staff of anyone coming and going.
Q. How do you ensure the safety of my parent?
A. We go to great lengths to protect our residents. Our staff are all trained by our management team prior to being on their own. Each staff member is background checked, fingerprinted, and vetted by a manager, our administrator and our owners prior to an offer of employment being extended to a candidate. Our home has video surveillance in the common areas (not in bedrooms or restrooms to protect resident privacy) of the home.
Q. How do I know that I am making the right decision for my elder.
A. Unfortunately, often you won’t know until you have made the decision and can see the results. We often find that elders don’t know they need help until they get it. As family or guardians we have to sometimes navigate this major choice for them, as in many cases we have found that an elders wants are often not firmly rooted in a healthy reality that is in their best interest. We have seen elders who miss multiple medications that are vital to their wellbeing so they are in health decline, resident that do not know if they have bathed or the last time that they did, residents that do not see their home as unkept or residents that are mentally indipendant but don’t realize how unstable they really are and that they are a fall risk. The elders reality is just that, their reality. As an elder ages so goes their conditions, these changes whether physically or cognitively are often not an overnight thing but something that has worsened over time, so to the elder there is no cause for alarm because it is part of their daily routine. Statistically there are more elders placed in care in January and February than any other months due to families coming home for the holidays and seeing that their elder isn’t the person that they saw a year ago. As an AFC provider we remove the risk to the elder and provide them with the necessary care for their wellbeing. We have seen many success stories, one story specifically comes to mind where we had resident that resisted the idea of being with us but by day thirty and after their adjustment period the resident began thanking us for caring for them and said that they love living with us.
If you have further questions feel free to contact JSY Elder Care Monday through Friday 8am- 4pm.
