3-11 LPN in an assisted living facility

KnitAndPurl · Apr 1, 2012

I am not much help when it comes to what to expect, but I just wanted to say good luck to you! It really sounds like it will be challenging and a great position!

Long Term Care Columnist / Guide · Apr 1, 2012

Actually, the types of folks you describe really are typical assisted-living residents nowadays. Like everywhere else, the acuity in AL has gone way up in the past decade or so; now, the average ALF resident is about where the average nursing-home patient was 15 years ago. We take residents on sliding-scale insulin, who have chronic wounds, hemiplegia, psychiatric problems....we even have short-term hospice respite patients who need to be turned, medicated, and changed Q 2 hrs.

As an LPN you will more than likely be the shift supervisor and have to deal with staffing issues, phone calls, doctors' orders, questions from family members, and even tours. You may have to do admissions as well; just like LTC, most of them come in the afternoon and the sooner a baseline admission assessment is done, the better. (I wish I had an LPN to do this sometimes!)

Hope this is helpful. Good luck in your new job!

alley31191 · Apr 2, 2012

Thank you both. I forgot to mention the facility is a memory care facility. All the residents have Alzheimers. There are quite a few on hospice,but when they get too bad,they are put on crisis care. There's two catheter residents. There are a couple that have sliding scale insulin.

KimberlyRN89, BSN, RN · Apr 2, 2012

I worked at a memory care facility for 2.5 yrs & what you described sounds like pretty on par for ALF's these days. Good luck :)