Renashia

I did a clinical at a alzheimer's unit in Tigard during my Master's program. At that time the Director was receiving around 45-47,000 a year. That Director was also a ARNP. In Seattle as DON in an Assisted Living I make between 48-50,000 a year depending on bonuses for no-overtime and staff turnover. With 5 years of nursing expereince and an almost finished Masters in nursing. I would suggest searching on google for salary comparisons for your area to see what a HSD is making. You have the years of nursing expereince to negotiate a respectable salary.

My facility got hit in Washington about 2 months ago. 75% sick in the Resident population. Our other facility had a 85% sick rate, but higher acuity. Word of warning. Norwalk is NOT killed by hand sanitizers. Staff must wash hands or use enough hand sanitizer that you hands stay wet for 1 minute. Use a 10% bleach 'activated' solution, normal bleach solutions are not effective either. We had an excellent infection control guru that I was able to get good guildlines from during our outbreak.

Actually part of the reason I posted was becuse I was looking for a journal in Assisted Living. We are really in a grey area. Not a retirement hoe not a SNF. Good and bad. I'm also lucky that I have a good boss. MAkes life so much easier for me.

It's also nice to see an age-mate as a DON. I'm the youngest person in our parent company running a nursing dept.

Weetziebat, I hope they have those every year. I think the only thing saving me is that my LPN has years of SNF expereince and I have a very small AL (58 rooms). My newest project is trying to memorize the WACs for assisted living. Making me cross-eyed.

That is too bad. I knida feel out on a limb in Assisted Living. I was lucky enough to attend an Assisted Living training put on by WHCA (washington Health CAre association) and got a lot of good information there. But I have no other resources to read, it's very frustrating.

If you have a PDA I recomend the free version of epocrates.com, nurse's version. (or if you have a computer at home, they have an on-line version that is also free). The PDA version is a great fast look up without flipping through a book and gives very specific info on what you need to teach/know about the drugs your giving. Also has a great multi-check so you can compare all those drugs your patient is on and look for intereactions!!!

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/news/local/licensetoharm/

Well the reson this article made the front page is the the State of Oregon didn't take away the offender's CNA licence for over a year. (well according to the media, and we all know how reliable THAT is) In which time he was able to secure a new CNA licence in Washington. About 1-2 years after the conviction of 2nd degree rape in Oregon, he was discovered in Washington. Washington DID not take away his licence for nearly 2 years!!! He supposedly fled to Sri Lanka, so he was deemed not to be a threat. In actuallity he got a fake SS#, Drivers licence and started working as a NA, which dosn't require the same backround check as a CNA. At last I heard they where unable to catch him.

I agree! One teaching method I like to do with my caregivers is "reality switch". They get to sit in a wheelchair, drink a full glass of water, and try to get someone to help them. Or they get to be a guinea pig in transfers, hoyer lift training, and feeding so they know how their residents feel. Too bad we couldn't return the favor to the nurse who assulted this resident!!

sigh, it was supposed to be rely.... not reply.:trout:

I have been the DON for about 8 months up here in the Seattle area. I am having difficulty finding good resources to review for Assisted Living. Ifind myself haveing to reply on NH guidelines and policies and trying to adapt them to assisted living. Anyone have any good resources for the Assisted Living Nurses?

YES! Nurses are manditory reporters and above all PATIENT ADVOCATES! I personally find it appauling that anyone is put in this situation as a new grad nurse. And that ANY resident is "taken down". It suggests to me that the facility cannot meet that resident's needs. I know it's different in SNFs and NH, but in an Assisted Living the resident must be stable and predictible to be a resident under the DON's care. You can make an anounomous tip to the State if you truly feel your job/standing is in jepordy, though it won't have as much of an impact. Also you can contact the local omsbudsman. Studies have shown the 70++% of the time problem behaviors in residents are directly related to the CAREGIVER approach. Personally I hope the nurse got a nice bacterial infection when the resident bit her. Good on you to report it! It is very difficult to pluck up the courage in a new job and a new feild. PErsoanlly I think it is great haveing a mixed population of nurses in any nursing area. You have the new "book smarts" and the "teaching of lifetime" expereinces to help provide excellent nursing to our elders. Good luck .. HHC LPN!!! For you DON---> :trout:

Anyone in WA and OR probually saw the articles few weeks ago about licenced CNAs convicted as sex offenders in OR moving to WA and having there licence's re-issued. I unfortinatly hired one of these **** . Lucky for us, my administrator saw the person's photo in the paper and we escorted him out of the building. The freaky thing is that his background check had come back without a record!!!!!! In our investigation we found that he had an alias, had lied about his address, had a fake SS# and fake drivers licence. The ONLY red flag we got was when we decided to run his alias name against the CNA database, which we never do since we don't hire CNAs. The state healthcare body and the state legal offices don't communicate between eachother. I'm sure you can see how freaky this is. I also have a lot of guilt for being the one who hired him. Even though he had an excellet reference (which we checked all 3), had a freindly and charasmatic peronality and the residents loved him. The only red flag I had about him was a n incident I witnessed with the trading between shifts where he approahed a young pretty Caregiver in, for lake of a better explaination, a "Mac Daddy" personality (put his arm around her shoulders, swaggered, and said "Hey Girl" to her). Which just raised the hairs on my neck. (We found later that his sex crime was againat a younger patient at a hopsital.) After that I had started to phase him out of working with this caregiver and I had reduced him to 1/2 time since he was having other problems with his job. Not sure why I'm venting, rather then that I have to. LOL, I REALLY wanted him to cause a seene when we escorted him out, I was itching to thump him a bit. Very un-nursey caring I know, but I can't stand anyone that would take advantage of a sick person or a young person.

Before taking the DON position at an Assisted Living, I interviewed for Alzheimer's Director positions in Oregon/Washington, pay was varied between 45,000-55,000 a year. With the difficulties associated with the unit I hope you would have a good game plan to change the culture of the unit. Sounds like about 1/2 the staff need to be let go. I'm not sure how much expereince you have witht he Dementias, but I would contact the local Alzheimer's association and get training materials and re-educate your staff. Introducing a new Alzheimer's care paradigm like "the best freinds approach" or "the eden project might get the ball rolling. Also contact local SCU in the area to get help. I think if you accept the job you will have to lay down some rules to the staff about conduct. I found that "My way or the Highway" was effective. You are the nurse and know what the residents need, don't let the caregivers run your unit. I hope you do take the job, it sounds like those residents and families deserve better then what they have going on now.