Briarfield Place

Reviewer RC#0103d

Mom had been to Briarfield Place three times. The third time we had to go back there was back in June when she just had an overall feeling of malaise and they thought she needed some more. That time, we ran into some very unfortunate things there. There was a nurse's aide who gave my mom a hard time about something. I didn't believe my mom at first but then I walked in and caught the nurse about three days later, she was kind of brutal with my mom. She was trying to tell her she could do things that my mom physically couldn't do, which is why they sent her there. She was saying "Sure you can stand up! Sure you can get to the bathroom by yourself." That kind of stuff. It was like, "No honey, that's why Mom's there." I went in and I just smiled at her and I went, "Hey, what's up?" and she went, "Oh, your mom's just being a little bit non-cooperative." No recognition on her part. She was being obnoxious, so I let it go. Then that same nurse's aide, less than a month later, was put in charge of the new employees coming in and I heard her (she didn't see me because I was sitting around the corner) telling these two new nurse trainees, "This lady is impossible to get along with. Be very careful with what you say and do in her room because she will report you." (and we reported her. ). She walked in the room and I pretended like I didn't hear that. She's like "Hi, how's it going and all that." Those two girls were so scared they wouldn't say a word to my mom. That nurse's aide had to go. On another occasion, they were telling us my mom was no longer appropriate for the rehab because she couldn't do the upper body part exercises. So they said they would have to discharge her. We were like, "Oh, okay, when?" Then they said, "We'll give you a month to figure out what you're going to do next, if you want to take her back home or if you want to take her to the facility, etc., etc.." Two days later, they called us and said, "Your mom's leaving." We were like "What? Wait, that was the fastest month I've ever seen in my life." We tried to meet with the social worker and say, "What would you recommend?" And she said that it's skilled nursing. I go "Honey, now this is beyond my scope of knowing what to do because I'd never been to a skilled nursing place before. I wouldn't even know what to look up or who around here falls in that category. Can you help us out?" They would not recommend anything. They don't put their name on the line for anything. So I just wrote on my computer "Need information about skilled nursing facilities.", then fortunately, somebody responded and gave me some ideas, but I did not get any ideas from Briarfield Place, which they should have helped out with, since they were saying mom couldn't stay there. The least they could do was help with the transition. The last couple of days when she was there, it was hot. It was summer and the ice cream truck came to the facility, which I thought was nice of the ice cream truck to stop there for the residents, but that's not what happened. The main lady who runs the organization there came around in the wing that we were in, and she told all the nurses at the desk "The ice cream man is there. If you all want to go get a treat, go ahead." She did not leave one person on that wing to watch the 4 or 5 rooms that were back there in the farthest corner away from help. They were gone five minutes before they came back. I went and stood at the desk and said, "Before you guys took a little break, Mom had rung and that she needed assistance, and then she's still needing assistance. Is there somebody who wants to come down there and help me?" They stared at me. I was like, "Come on, people." So I had a problem with that. Then on the final day when she was there, the social worker who was supposed to be seeing us through the process didn't come around and help us or assist us. They just said to us, "Your mom could leave at 10 a.m. tomorrow." We went past the nurse's desk, and down a long corridor, nobody in sight, no nurses, just some residents. Out to the front desk where the secretary sits, she said "Goodbye!" and then we left. When I got home, I realized, "My God! You guys didn't give us her meds." So I got back on the phone and I went, "I'm sorry, but we didn't have my mom's meds when we were leaving." The head lady that ran that organization got on the phone and was screaming at me saying that was my fault. I said "I'm not trying to assign blame here. I'm just trying to get the meds because we need them." Probably my fault because I didn't make a big to-do or anything like that. We just walked up quietly, but I said "We walked by the main desk. We walked by a nurse's station. We walked out of things but nobody was there to say anything. So we just got in the van and came home." She was like, "Well, you have to come pick them up." I was like, "Okay, I will.", but I have a slight problem. I can't drive because I have retinopathy. So, it took me about six hours to arrange for a ride and it would have been after they were gone. So I had to wait until the next morning to go pick up the meds. I was just praying that nothing happened to my mom, because she was missing her meds for the day. So I was worried about it but there was nothing I could do because of my own eyesight problem. I got there the next morning, and then I walked into the building and the secretary, Michelle, sat at the main desk and she said to me, "You stay right here or sit in this chair. We'll take care of getting the nurse down here to see you." like I was some sort of criminal. So I walked back out into the outer lobby and I sat on the bench that was in the outer lobby. I wasn't going to touch anything in their building. I didn't want anything from their building. I thought they had treated us rotten there. Then the little nurse came down to give them to us. The lady said, "Christine will be here in a few minutes." I had never met a nurse named Christine. Then down the hall came a guy named Chris. He goes "Hi! I'm Chris.". Then I realized they don't even know who's working for them because it was a Christopher, not a Christine. He was new. He saw us walk by, but he didn't know to stop us, to give us the meds. I don't know why he didn't know, but he was only like the second day on the job. So maybe he just didn't know the routines well enough yet, but he was very apologetic and was very nice. I just had a real problem with the way the main lady and the secretary at the desk acted. I just said one thing and the head lady that runs the organization goes, "Do you have anything else you want to say?" And I said nicely so as not to argue with her, "I'll put my thoughts down in writing on the form you send us to evaluate." She said, "Tell me now!" or something like that." I've waited since June and she has not sent us through the rest of the year a review. So, she knew she was going to get that review from me and she just didn't send it. They have a very nice cook, though. He tried to individualize what people's needs were. Mom got the largest room she had ever put in. It had a bed against the back. Like when you walked into the room, you couldn't see her bed. So, they had instant privacy. There was plenty of space on both sides of the bed. If you had some reason to have people standing around the bed or sitting around, you could be close enough to your mom. It was big enough for a wheelchair to get through on both sides. The TV was up on the wall and you could put it down. I like the way you could adjust the sound system in that particular room. Their TVs worked excellently so that was some help from my mom for entertainment. Their activities didn't always have variety at all five days a week, but they had nice activities, except bingo.

hammond

Very clean. But staff has one speed...SLOW. It's a if they want patients to fall. Left alone in bathroom no one came to help. Had to get up on my own. Only 2 days in after leg surgery...hate to see after a week what happens...pray for me.

DD25JJ

Admission liaison at the facility informed the hospital case manager that my 99 year old mother had a room at Briarfield Place upon discharge. This was secured on May 10th. She was scheduled for discharge on the 12th pending cardiology clearance. Feeling positive about the availability, I returned to Pennsylvania to gather some of her belongings. I received a phone call from the hospital case manager at approximately 1:50 p.m informing me that Briarfield Place "gave her bed away". I was then told there would be a bed available the following Monday. That, too, was untrue as I was informed Monday morning that no bed was available. I requested to speak with the administrator but she was "unavailable". Although multiple excuses were offered by the intake placement team at the nursing home, there is medical chart documentation confirming my account of the events. I am giving the facility one star based on grossly unreliable information given by the admission personnel at Briarfield.

Diane

My mom's a resident of Briarfield Place. It's a new facility, I think it's only been open for one year. It's very clean. I was there maybe two full days and a half. People were coming in to do some cleaning, her eye drops, and medication, and she needed assistance toileting and showering. The people were very nice. She had a bed and two chairs in her room, a walk-in shower, and the toilet was set up with rails and grab bars on the side and everything. It was very nice. For the most part, I would say the staff were good. Unfortunately, two times, she had to have a boot on because she had fractured her fibula, and they put it on the wrong foot. We did bring it to their attention, and it has not happened since. I eat off her plate a little bit and the food was very tasty. They had a pretty good variety of food. She was asked if there is anything that she doesn't like. She doesn't eat red meat and she doesn't eat mushrooms, so they always had that little note on her tray to ensure that she did not get what she was not going to eat.