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On Tuesday afternoons in Portland, Oregon, residents at one senior living community are proudly reveling in the fruits (and vegetables!) of their labor at the residents’ weekly Farmer’s Market.

Rose Villa is a not-for-profit, active retirement community located on the banks of the Willamette River, offering cottage homes and a continuum of care from independent living to assisted living.  Unlike other area CCRCs that are located in high-rise towers, Rose Villa is comprised of single-story apartments, spread out over 22 acres.

The Farmer’s Market is a weekly affair for the resident gardeners of Rose Villa.  However, in this community, the garden was not conceived by the Rose Villa administration as something to keep the residents occupied; quite the contrary.  David Mayer, Public Relations Manager, explains, “The community garden is, and has always been, a resident-directed feature.”  Shortly after its opening some 50 years ago, the residents approached Rose Villa staff with an idea.  Just across the road from the main property where all the apartments were located sat two acres of vacant land, also owned by Rose Villa, which they wanted to develop into their own garden for growing fresh fruits and vegetables.

At that time, the administration told the residents that they were welcome to use the property for gardening.  However, the Rose Villa Staff would be unable to offer any ‘official’ support for the project.  The residents were enthusiastic and went right to work.

Today it is evident that the resident-operated community garden has grown, and thrived, with very little assistance or intervention from the staff.  All plot organization, maintenance, and management is overseen by a resident garden committee.  Adds Mayer, “Our job as staff is to just help when they ask for it, and then stay out of their way!”

Whatever the growers don’t eat themselves, they are able to sell to other residents at the weekly resident farmer’s market. Or, they can donate their bounty to the main dining room.

The residents take pride in their work and enjoy sharing it with others in the community.  “It is pretty amazing to see the garden each summer,” admits Mayer.

For more information about Rose Villa Senior Living Community, please visit their website.

By Kristin Sullivan

Concordia Lutheran Ministries, a Pittsburgh-area nonprofit senior care provider that currently provides care for 1,400 seniors, has launched a “college for seniors” program, called the Concordia Institute for Lifelong Learning. In its inaugural semester, Fall 2009, there were more than 80 senior participants, and enrollment is already high for the new semester, beginning Feb. 9.

“Concordia Institute for Lifelong Learning was specifically designed to promote mental fitness for seniors,” explains Concordia Haven Apartments Program Director Cathy Questiaux. “Concordia offers this ‘ageless university’ to our residents, as well as to seniors in the community, to provide them an opportunity to learn something new in a relaxed, pressure free environment.”

The classes, most of which are just $35 for five weeks, include Beginning German, Beginning Spanish, Introduction to Ballroom Dancing, Introduction to Typing, Let’s Talk About Decorating, Using Computers Creatively, and Eating Well for Life through Food and Nutrition. Ongoing classes also including line dancing and watercolor painting.

“These are not your typical craft sessions,” Questiaux says. In fact, she says, some of the courses are specifically designed to meet seniors’ changing needs. “While all the classes are pretty interesting, the home décor class ‘Let’s Talk About Decorating’ offers a unique perspective for seniors, many of whom have downsized to a smaller living situation,” she says. “The idea behind the class is that there are still many ways to beautifully decorate a retirement apartment.”

Instructors come from local schools and community colleges, from the Concordia staff, and from the ranks of residents themselves.

“There are so many beneficial aspects to Concordia Institute,” says Concordia Vice President for Retirement Services Larry Talmadge. “It’s great for your mental fitness and alertness, socialization, self-esteem, learning new skills, broadening your horizons, achieving goals and so much more. We’re extremely proud of the program and the good it’s doing in this community; we hope to see it grow exponentially.”

For more information on Concordia Lutheran Ministries, please visit their website.

For patients, patient families, doctors, nurses and other trained medical staff and employees, it is very important to know that the hospice organization and facility they are directly associated with is of high quality, meeting both federal and state regulations. New hospice medical staff members and other employees can check with federal and state medical licensors to ensure proper licensing and to determine whether acceptable standards are exhibited by a certain hospice facility, management and ownership. An exceptionally beneficial professional organization to hospice patients, families and caregivers is the Hospice Patients Alliance (HPA) founded in 1998 by Ron Panzer, an experienced, very knowledgeable and caring nurse. As a nonprofit and charitable organization, HPA actively provides detailed hospice-related information and support to the public, as well as aiding in protection of hospice patients, their families and caregivers, the bereaved, and facility staff members. A major purpose of HPA is that of helping prevent all violations of legal rights and financial exploitation of hospice patients and their families while ensuring that hospice facility treatment provides all possible measures to control patient pain and symptoms of distress during end of life cycle care.1

Regulations governing both nonprofit and for-profit hospices are essentially identical, since all hospices must conform to state laws and the Code of Federal Regulations for hospice operation. These laws and regulations stipulate that each hospice patient must meet requirements for Medicare and certification for terminal illness or end of life care. In return, hospice ownership and management agree to provide qualified staffing along with safe and effective ongoing treatment plans for each patient and well coordinated rapport with patient family members. In addition, each hospice medical director must be a licensed doctor of medicine or osteopathy who skillfully assumes complete medical responsibility for treatment offered. Also, every hospice is required to have a governing body to take full legal responsibility for all facility policies and operational procedures.

Although no one should assume that for-profit hospices provide inferior care to nonprofit, since hospices are paid a per-diem rate throughout a patient’s residence, hospice management may, at times, be tempted to cut back services in order to raise profit levels, to the detriment of patient care. In some instances, some hospices actually manipulate patients who desire to die at home into hospice facilities to help fill beds to capacity and increase profits. For this reason, it is imperative for patient family members and caregivers to be well-informed concerning required services and treatments, becoming assertive in advocating needs of a loved one and staying involved in decisions made concerning that patient. It’s also extremely important—for patient families and advocates along with hospice staff members and potential new employees—to know that, although some hospice corporations and facilities avoid complying with laws and government regulations for treating and servicing patients and their families, the majority of hospices now operating in the US provide highly professional, ethical and well-managed dignified care to elderly patients within or nearing the end of life cycle.

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1 http://www.hospicepatients.org