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I’m not sure what level DH is right now, top AL or bottom MC so I’m looking for a facility with both. But if he should eventually need nursing home level care, having to move him again would be difficult and upsetting. There’s also a pretty big jump in price for all levels, across the board, in facilities that have an onsite nursing home.

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Memory Care normally agrees to keep a resident until death, as it's intended to be their last home. Hospice is called in when end of life approaches, for extra help, and if Skilled Nursing is needed, you'd be applying for Medicaid anyway I'd think, which means a move. My mother was incontinent, wheelchair bound, falling constantly, had CHF and other issues like Sundowning agitation, and MC had no issue keeping her. Her rent in 2022 was $6500 a month. Not including meds or Depends, until hospice came in and then that's all covered by Medicare too. That was in the greater Denver area at a beautiful 23 bedroom Memory Care Assisted Living facility.

If DH gets placed, be sure to find out what their policy is on keeping residents till death. Of course, you cannot anticipate behavioral issues but a good MC will work with a geriatric psychiatrist to get the right meds prescribed. The docs come into the MC, along with lab techs. Its very convenient and a Godsend. I even had travel dentists come in to extract teeth for mom. Very high prices, but very convenient as they work on the resident in their own recliner!

Best of luck.
Helpful Answer (3)
Reply to lealonnie1
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Whatever the choice, when the elder moves, someone is hired or family moves things. Family should be around for item placement in the room. Upon death, family needs to remove belongings within a few days so as not to incur another month of rent. When transitioning to SNF the elder might need fewer furnishings.
I moved my mom from 1 MC to another in a different state with multi levels. She passed in MC so she did not need the last step. However when moving things out, a single bedroom only required a small UHaul and less than 3 hours with sorting out what goes to donate and what goes to trash and those 2stops plus 1 to drop items to my home we're all completed in that final trip.
As far as services within her multi facility, each unit ran independent of staff with the exception of med techs. If a higher level of nursing care was needed, mom would have to move to the next unit to receive that care or I would have had to hire outside help.
As far as increasing costs, yes, I am familiar. The more your husband needs, the costs go up. Expect this with yearly cost increases as well.
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Reply to MACinCT
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I think it is nice and I think it's convenient and I think you need to be basically made of money. The "nursing home" connected to a private pay ALF is usually "memory care" and usually runs on average close to 20,000 a month. These facilities are really wonderful in that it is familiar surroundings (my brother in So Cal had this set up in cottages that housed about 14 persons each in a beautiful park-like setting, and one of the large cottages was the memory care). Moreover, if there is a couple, and one in need of memory care and the other in ALF still, then that works well. And they have familiar faces and places around them.

It is a matter of what you an find, what can work for you.
My parents in Missouri had basically a Village, where they started in IL in a condo, moved to apartments, then to ALF and then for my mom briefly to MC. Worked wonderfully for them. Again, private pay and a matter of affordability.
I wish you the best.
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Reply to AlvaDeer
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