Oak Manor

The Oak Manor Skilled Nursing Facility failed our mother who was in their hospice care. We originally were preparing her for the Assisted Living community and loved the villas and services provided. When our mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer, she believed, based on the warmth and responsiveness of Michele in marketing for the ALF, that she would receive the best of palliative care on the same property. Sadly this was not to be. At this point I believe it’s fair to mention that 80% of the staff we dealt with at Oak Manor (ALF, Business Dept, Nursing and Aides, etc.) were caring and doing the best they could with the training they had. Unfortunately, Mom was put on the rehab side of the building and not the hospice side, and the staff did not have the appropriate training to handle the end of life care she needed. In fact, I asked one aide if she had ever had a hospice patient and she said mom was her first. Another aide hadn’t even completed her CNA license and was on the floor with patients. During her first week there, mom was weak and unable to do the 3-point turn to have an aide assist in getting her in a wheelchair and into the bathroom. She fell twice during that week – one was considered an assist to the floor, the second was a fall that cut her elbow. We were there when they still attempted to get her to the bathroom and we had to listen to her cry out in pain throughout the ordeal, then hear her apologize to the aides because she didn’t want to be a burden. We purchased a PureWick system that allowed her to stay in bed so she would be spared these painful and humiliating attempts. We quickly realized that our presence was required to speak on her behalf. In a misguided attempt to help her gain strength, despite the rapid decline in her health, the facility kept sending rehab to her room. We had a Care Plan meeting with the heads of the departments to review what was in her best interest and we specifically asked that they stopped the rehab attempts, to no avail. During said meeting, we also discussed that mother could no longer eat solid food. We were told they would provide soft foods, again, to no avail. In the midst of our emotional distress in dealing with a dying family member, we were also forced to turn away rehab daily and send her food tray back each meal to get the soft foods promised. Suncoast Hospice assigned a nurse to her that was as baffled as we were at the repeated disregard for what had been decided in the Care Plan meeting versus what was actually being done. Mom was in quite a bit of pain that was not being controlled with the prescribed medicine intervals. She had additional doses, as needed, but was unable to speak for herself at that point. So we stayed with her – at first during all of the allowed visiting hours, then at night when she continued to decline – feeding her, requesting that her urine collection device be emptied, turning away rehab and solid foods, requesting more pain meds when she winced. We contacted Hospice to notify them that the increased doses of pain meds and shorter intervals they wrote orders for were not being followed. After multiple attempts at “re-educating” Oak Manor, as Hospice described the reviewing of her charts with them, we began a successful campaign to have mom moved to a Suncoast Hospice Care Center. We are grateful that the Unit Manager, Sharon, assisted so kindly with our requests. She was the one who arranged for us to visit before the quarantine was concluded – truly a gift since mom’s time on earth was limited to a month after her diagnosis. She also spoke on our behalf to allow for more visitors as mom declined. The majority of the staff was equally compassionate but the lack of communication and what must be described as training gaps, left us with a heavy heart that we chose that institution in our mom’s darkest hours.