Opinion | How to Improve Nursing Home Care - The New York Times

To the Editor:

“How Nursing Homes Hide Their Most Serious Lapses” (front page, Dec. 10) exposes conditions in nursing homes, issues with their regulation and the underlying problems with the care of our seniors. The examples cited are believable, but might it have been more balanced to include the good work done in these settings?

If it were easy to care for elderly people with significant health, memory and behavior problems, more of us would be keeping our frail parents at home with us. If it’s not possible for us to do it, it’s certainly not simple for nursing homes to care for many such people.

It’s even more of a problem that their overworked staff are paid so little. Other than spending more to increase staffing at these places, what else could we do? Might we pay staff members based on the quality of care they give? Could each of us volunteer to help at our local senior facilities four hours a week?

Might some seniors do well in smaller “group home” settings? Could society better support families that keep their elderly relatives in their homes? Could we admit more immigrants specifically to help care for our parents?

I don’t excuse egregious lapses in care, but do we expect perfection from nursing homes? Think it’ll be better when you’re 90?

Jesse Samuels
West Hartford, Conn.
The writer is a retired family physician.

To the Editor:

I strongly commend “How Nursing Homes Hide Their Most Serious Lapses.” This is not a new issue. I testified before the Senate Finance...

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