Types of Community Care Facilities
Housing arrangements providing non-medical services to seniors are known under several names. The terms used to describe the Residential Assisted Living industry varies from state to state, but it is commonly referred to as “assisted care,” “residential care,” or “assisted living.” Community Care Facilities provide services to vulnerable residents such as frail elderly, developmentally disabled, mentally ill, trouble teens, and others. Small Entrepreneurs to very large corporations own and operate facilities to provide care and services to these individuals.
These businesses maybe private-for-profit or non-profit and may be called by many names including: Assisted Living Facility, Adult Congregate Care, Residential Care, Personal Care Home, Residential Care Facility for the Elderly, Homes for the Aged, Domiciliary Care Homes, Adult Day Care Facility, Adult Residential Facility and others.
RCFs and ALFs form a major component of the nation's long-term care delivery system. The terms most used nationwide are Residential Care Facility and Assisted Living Facility. When used on this website Residential Care Facility (RCF) will basically refer to facilities which provide private rooms, or shared rooms, and community accommodations for dining and living rooms.
Assisted Living Facility (ALF) usually refers to the facilities in which the residents have individual apartments often with a kitchen and living room. Many Assisted Living Facilities have been converted from Retirement Communities due to the resident's "aging in place." Rather than lose these "aging in place residents", the retirement home will obtain a license and make the necessary structural changes needed to provide care services.
Both types of facilities, RCFs and ALFs, can provide the same degree of care services.
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Administrator's Monthly Plans & Owner's Monthly Plans
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Retention Rates - Keeping Your Residents
By Diane Morrow, LNHA
 Resident Care Facilities for the Elderly, Developmentally Disabled and Mentally Ill should focus more on resident retention during these hard times.
Keeping residents is even more important than recruiting new ones considering research indicates that it’s 5 to 7 times more expensive to find a new resident than it is to keep your current residents.
In the United Kingdom the average length of stay for a resident in a residential care facility is 18 months to 2 years. In Australia “...of those who enter, women will stay 3.5 years, whereas men will stay for 2.3 years. In American nursing homes, the 1999 average was 2.5 years. I researched this issue 15 years ago, and the average was 2 to 3 years in residential care facilities in United States. When I conducted my own Resident Retention Review and audited my own 49-bed care facility, the average was 5 years.
The reasons why residents leave can vary, common reasons are the need for a higher level of care, the family moved or wanted a better location, they are unhappy with the services, dislike of another resident, or they like another facility better. Read More
Charging for Care Provided
By Diane Morrow, LNHA
 When I started my first care home, which was a 6-bed facility, I didn’t care about making a decent profit. I was happy just making ends meet. Caring was my ministry and ministries typify giving and not receiving. However, over the years, I learned I needed to make a profit and a decent one at that.
In business you have many bills that absolutely must be paid and many people counting on you. If you have employees, they are counting on you to pay them decent wages and benefits. The residents are expecting good food, electricity, enough care assistance to meet their needs, activities and so on. Your personal needs are just as important, like supporting your family decently, having something saved for emergencies, and to save for retirement. However, profit can never compromise care!
Several years ago I had an awful incident at my facility, which greatly illustrates the need for making sure you are charging for care provided. One day I was having a late lunch at my facility, which was unusual since I was out of town teaching most of the time. One of the Personal Care Aides joined me. As she and I were chitchatting, the issue of money came up. I explained to her, that we needed to get our revenue up before anyone could get a raise, and that the next couple of residents we take may have to be “heavy care”. We normally only accepted light care, but kept the residents as long as possible, therefore we always had a couple of heavy care. Read More
Resident Orientation – A Period of Adjustment
 Can you imagine how you would feel if you have to move into a care facility? One of the primary things you would want to know is where everything is located, and how you can access the services the facility provides. It is difficult to move into a facility, no matter how excited the resident may seem, it is still stressful.
The recently updated sample Resident Orientation (Form) found on ProvidersWeb’s website is designed to help facility personnel assist the resident in learning about their new environment and how to comfortably function in it. Example: making sure the resident knows how to use the emergency call system.
Demonstrating how the call system works, and then allowing the resident to use it a couple of times during the demonstration, will make the resident feel more secure. Often, within the first 24 hours, the resident will use it, just to see if someone will really come to assist them.
Other important things to inform the resident include:
- Resident Emergency Procedures.
- Where the sign out and in form is located.
- Location of: Bathrooms, dining room, activity room, common rooms, shower rooms and linen closet.
- A written list of how and when their medications will be given to them for self-administration.
- Learning the resident’s bathing or showering requirements, and setting up mutually acceptable times for bathing. Informing the resident when the staff will be assisting the resident in taking his/her shower(s) will be very helpful in reducing stress.
There are other things you can do to reduce the stress of moving for the resident. The direct care staff should complete the Resident Orientation (Form) the day of admission. This orientation procedure will help ensure the basic aspects of their care and services are explained to the resident.
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