Happenings at Heritage Manor- Mt. Sterling

We have been working on changes at Heritage Manor in Mt. Sterling for the last three years to provide Resident Centered Care. One of the changes was serving meals off the buffet, which allows residents to choose when they want to eat, what they want to eat, and who they want to sit with. It also allows residents to get up when they want in the morning, as there's a longer time frame that breakfast is served. Staff also lets residents with dementia sleep until they wake up, which makes their entire day better. in addition, the animals we have provide spontaneity, fun, something to talk about, and they are a tool that allows residents to "give care" to someone else. These are just two of the many changes we have made.

Recently 12 staff members from different departments have attended 4 different seminars about Resident Centered Care. Staff are excited. We don't want to make Heritage Manor homelike, we want to make it HOME. We will be discussing with all of our staff what they want Heritage to look like a year from now and ways to make that happen. Making this happen will involve a technique known as a learning circle. Staff will begin using these several times a week around 2pm. This will be a time to discuss how residents are doing, what else they might need or want, and how staff can see that this gets done. They will discuss any problems in their areas that are preventing them from doing for residents and seek resolutions. The goal is to improve communication, improve teamwork, improve morale, and empower frontline staff. Ideally in a good Resident Centered Care environment we want the residents to be empowered to speak up for what they want and need, but if they are unable to do this then we want the people closest to them to speak up for them. Eventually, we expect this learning circle will involve residents and families also.

Ideally this will be time to really get to know each other and find out what each one has to offer toward making this HOME.