Did I just see that 5,500 senior citizens have died in nursing homes?

[malaise]

Who is doing this to our seniors - and more importantly WHY?

[ramblin_dave]

1. NBC reports

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/coronavirus-deaths-u-s-nursing-homes-soar-more-5-500-n1184536

[malaise]

2. Jebus Effin' Krist

That is all

[ProfessorGAC]

6. I Believe It, Sort Of

Like my post last night, 22 residents at that home. Even if they're an outlier, the 5,500 is low.
If that home were typical (unlikely) it would only take 250 nursing homes in the entire country.
Geez, we have one big one here, and there's only 6,000 people living here!
Even if that home about which I posted was 5x the average (massive outlier), it would only take 1,250 nursing homes in the whole country!
This number might actually be low.

[SheltieLover]

3. Which repuke owns the nursing homes?

This is beyond belief! 🤬😳

[malaise]

4. many - remember the dead people in the home in Florida after a hurricane a

few years ago

[Ms. Toad]

11. It isn't directly a matter of politics

Although indirectly it is because of the low wages paid to many of the staff that cause them to work more than one nursing home job.

Nursing home staff often work in multiple nursing homes, and live in the community. That means they are exposed in the community (or in one nursing home) they then take the virus to each nursing home in which they work.

The nursing home population (1) needs lots more personal care - so they can't self-isolate and are at the mercy of the personal hygeine habits of their care providers (who are both pushed to work because nursing homes are notoriously short-staffed and becuase their pay is very low) and (2) the residents are the most vulnerable population. Once COVID 19 enters a nursing home, it spreads rapidly and kills a higher percentage of the population than it would in the wider community.

[FBaggins]

5. Probably higher

Nursing homes account for about 1/4 of all deaths in the country each year... so call that ~50,000 per month. Large numbers of them from respiratory distress that could easily be Covid-19 (but also many other viruses).

A large percentage of the recent report were in NY... so it could be part of their effort to count everything that could be related to the virus as part of the death count.

[gibraltar72]

7. Don't remember which chain but one is a yuuuuge Trump supporter.

Think they pushed him to do away with standards that Obama implemented.

[dweller]

8. in the county i live

we have 75+ cases of covid19 of which 57 are in 1 senior living facility

reported on our local newscast tuesday, they did not name the facility

✌🏼

[Hoyt]

9. While I get the point, too many nursing home patients are a few months

away from dying, with or without CV19. Plus, it’s hard to isolate them.

Close to 1.5 million patients are in nursing homes. While some just need monitoring and assistance with living, others are quite ill.

[moriah]

10. Or more correctly, many already have signed DNRs.

For whatever reason -- expenses, having lived long enough, etc -- they had decided that when it was their time, it was their time.

My grandmother (well before the pandemic, like years ago) was still transferred to hospital care when she started coughing worse (COPD from living with a smoker combined with congestive heart failure, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, epilepsy, ministrokes, and falls from both latter conditions) and the home was expecting her back. While in the hospital, she had a massive heart attack -- no one predicted it, they thought she just needed her fluid balance better. She was 90.

And she'd signed a DNR/living will upon admission to a nursing home, because her husband had already been dead for more than a decade, and she didn't want extraordinary assistance to stay alive. So they didn't even attempt CPR -- her order had been signed.

-------

So even if they don't have conditions that are going to kill them in a few months -- Granny was in that home for several years after her second broken hip and costs to have an in-home health aide were just too high -- many have already decided what they wanted when they got sick enough to die. Antibiotics, oxygen, feeding tubes maybe, but not going on a vent or being brought back from cardiac arrest.

So yes, our elderly in nursing homes are both the targets this virus will attack, and many have signed papers that already said they didn't want extraordinary measures.

It still shows the issue of asymptomatic carriers and infections of medical personnel, because surely they locked down visitation in NJ like most did even in my red state. Pretty much our tests are ONLY going to hospitalized patients, then trying to test contacts and health care workers, specifically nursing home workers and patients. Our governor has been honest that our labs do not have the reagents or the capacity to test more than that, but the state prioritized nursing homes in our surveillance over the general public.

And I'm okay with that, given that the nursing home my grandmother was in for so many years, a damn good one, was one of the first to get COVID-19 cases. Some may be on their last legs, but not all. They also have a rehabilitation wing (she was in it twice), so people who just need temporary care due to broken bones are also getting it.

[malaise]

12. Valid point

but some are not being monitored and reports suggest that there is very little assistane. What's more their families cannot communicate with them.

[Ms. Toad]

14. In the nursing homes I've been intimately familiar with (seven I can name off the top of my head)

it is not the case that they are "a few months away from dying."

My grandmother lived in a nursing home for more than a decade, another grandmother for at least 5 years, my parents are in an extended care community (for a decade now) - with an included nursing home where residents tend to live a few years (not months), and I have several friends and another grandmother, and three elderly aunts/great aunts who each lived for multiple years in one of three nursing homes. From what I've seen, neither these 7 nursing homes in two states (4 cities) nor my 11 friends and relatives are atypical in the population or duration of stay.

But whether or not they are quite ill, all are more vulnerable than the general population because most moved there only when they could no longer care for themselves. That gives them at least two strikes against them: age, and mandatory physical contact with a variety of caregivers.

[Hoyt]

15. The median length of stay before death is less than 6 months. Assisted Living

centers are longer, but I’m talking poorly funded SNFs where people are usually elderly with cardiac, respiratory, dementia, kidney, etc., diseases. It’s sad and the funding, usually Medicaid, is dismal.

[Ms. Toad]

16. That is very different from my experience.

I don't know anyone who has died within 6 months of entering the nursing home. Pretty sure I don't know anyone who has died within 2 years of entering the nursing home. At least three of the 11 I am intimately with were SNF, primarily funded by Medicaid. The 2 people I know who in one of them lived there a minimum of 5 years each. In the other two, at least two years in each of two separate facilities.

This figure would be more consistent with my experience:

According to the National Center for Assisted Living, 59% of all assisted living residents will eventually move to a skilled nursing facility. The average stay in a nursing home is 835 days, according to the National Care Planning Council.

[Hoyt]

17. Again, you are looking at assisted living, which is not a skilled nursing facility.

"Of its sample of nursing home patients who died between 1992 and 2006, a full 80 percent were dead within one year, claims the study, which appears in the current edition of the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. The paper also determined that death, like life, ain't fair: Men die faster than women; and married people die quicker than single ones. Counter-intuitively, however, richer people die faster than poorer ones."

https://archives.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2010/08/26/old-people-die-alarmingly-quickly-in-nursing-homes-study-finds


"The length of stay data were striking:

"The median length of stay in a nursing home before death was 5 months
the average length of stay was longer at 14 months due to a small number of study participants who had very long lengths of stay
65% died within 1 year of nursing home admission
53% died within 6 months of nursing home admission "

https://www.geripal.org/2010/08/length-of-stay-in-nursing-homes-at-end.html


Even assisted living ain't that great.

[Ms. Toad]

18. The article I linked to was specifically addressing survival time in SNF

Although I agree the wording was confusing.

In the articles you linked to, the average stay was far longer than a few months (14 months).

And - the post to which I initially responded did not specify which kind of nursing home you were referring to.

While I get the point, too many nursing home patients are a few months away from dying, with or without CV19. Plus, it’s hard to isolate them.

Close to 1.5 million patients are in nursing homes. While some just need monitoring and assistance with living, others are quite ill.

Certainly the final sentence suggest you were speaking about nursing homes, in general, rather than making an observation that was limited to SNF.

[babylonsister]

13. At least 5,670 nursing home residents have died from coronavirus

At least 5,670 nursing home residents have died from coronavirus

https://www.axios.com/nursing-homes-coronavirus-deaths-eefb5667-8d06-4d0a-9ccb-ea6872cecebd.html

I think it's a combo of neglect, fear, and probably staff bailing. They didn't sign up to die and don't get paid nearly enough.

Yes, this is the forgotten population, our moms and dads, grandparents. Per Rachel, they haven't even been important enough to count until recently.

Then there are stories like this that are truly gut-wrenching...

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/coronavirus/17-bodies-found-in-new-jersey-nursing-home-after-anonymous-tip/2275586/
17 Bodies Found in NJ Nursing Home After Anonymous Tip
An anonymous tip said the bodies had been moved there after being stored in a shed, the New York Times first reported
Published April 16, 2020 • Updated 3 hours ago

[LisaL]

19. Old, sickly people are main victims of covid. Death rate is much higher among older people with

pre-existing conditions. People don't normally end up in nursing homes if they are healthy.