State:: Washington

Occupation:: Med Tech- CNA

My first job in healthcare was a huge blessing but soon turned into a huge nightmare due to the ineffective management of the “for profit” company that I was employed with. It is an “Assisted Living” complex in the state of Washington. I worked swing shift and enjoyed the actual work itself. However, since there are no concrete regulations on Assisted Living homes in Washington state in regards to the staff to patient ratio as well as the condition of the patient an assisted living home can take in, I was put in the position of caring for 43 individuals each night. There are currently two staff members for the 88 bed complex.

In addition to this ratio, the majority of the individuals that were living here should have been in a nursing home rather than an assisted living home due to the level of care they needed. The company that I worked for took these patients in because they needed to fill space, not recognizing that we could not adequately provide the level of care these individuals needed.

We had a few that used Hoyer Lifts, most were incontinent, and most had some form of dementia both severe and beginning stages.

There needs to be stricter regulations on the Assisted Living side of healthcare and this one incident is a direct reflection of the inadequacies that are prevalent throughout Washington state.