Bellaken Garden and Skilled Nursing Center

Reviewer#RDk1002b

I'm staying at Bellaken Garden and Skilled Nursing Center. If there's one word I would use to describe this place is that it's inconsistent. There are some good things and some bad things. The other thing that makes it very difficult to be here is that very few of the staff speak English. Most of them speak Chinese, and it's very difficult to communicate with them. Overall, I would not recommend the place. I do have some physical therapists that come in.

John

I'm in Bellaken Garden & Skilled Nursing Center for rehab, and it's been very good. I also like the fact that they're in a military insurance provider network. The upkeep is very good, too. It was hard for me to learn about the staff here. Once I did, they were very dedicated to their job. They are very good. My primary concern was having insurance coverage for the facility that I went to. I'm a Navy veteran and have life insurance coverage. My main motivation was to get into a facility that was in my insurance provider's network. Bellaken is in their network. It was a little bit difficult for me to get used to the food at first. A lot of the residents here are Asian, so the food has an Asian quality to it. The food really is quite good.

Helen

I thought that Bellaken Garden was a nice facility when I visited. It's kind of small. The staff and representative were very friendly. There are no private rooms, and it was clean. I like that they had a lot of outside space that you could meet with your family. They have common spaces, but it was kind of closed for COVID. All the meals were in the room. They said that they offer all activities, and they have them available in-house. I saw a therapy room. I saw the shower room, and those were adequate.

Kim

We ended up placing my mom in Bellaken Garden in Oakland's assisted living. We were able to visit and we went through her Medicare health plan with them and they did some sort of contract regarding the health care service part. The other residential fee and stuff we would be paying out of pocket. It was a very good fit for her. When we called, the staff was very responsive to asking initially what we were looking for, and then the application process was done with them. Plus, they worked with my mother's Medicare health plan and that was very useful. My mother was also looking for a place where the staff could speak the Cantonese language. She speaks Cantonese and a large number of the staff there are Cantonese-speaking. My mother also needed a certain level of care, she's wheelchair-bound, she needed a place that was willing to accept and have staff that was qualified to help her at her level of care. There were a few places that we spoke to that basically could not accept her. She's in a shared room. It's okay, it's not great but it's good for the price we're paying. I know there are some nice ones, but they were so expensive. We spoke to the administrative staff about the meals and actually, the place has a lot of residents who are Chinese and a lot of staff that is Chinese. They cater to Cantonese and Chinese food and my mother likes it. So, it was a good fit. Right now, during the pandemic, there are no group amenities. The residents are pretty much still confined to their own rooms and stuff. I believe they have an exercise program and there is a community area, like a communal area. The building itself, the facility itself is in the center of the inner city but when you go there, it's actually very secluded and it's kind of in a cul-de-sac and it's very quiet. So, we were very surprised. It almost feels like it's not in the city so that's why we liked it.

Carolyn326321

Bellaken Garden was very nice, the staff was very good, they have skilled nursing and assisted living, and they were very helpful in getting my mom in a soon as possible. They're very good so far and very welcoming. They have activities every day, but we had to watch the direction on the food though. They had singing, services in the community room, and Bingo.

Caring112721350

My mom was supposed to go to Bellaken Garden; however, they gave up her room. The staff was nice, but the people were just sitting out in the hallways with nothing to do. The rooms were kind of sterile. They were all shared rooms. They had two dining rooms because it was a fairly large facility. They had bingo, trips, and activities. My mom was a Chinese, and a lot of the residents were also Chinese. It was more of a community for her.