We are staying here at Anthem Lakes assisted living, but I am looking for something that's a little bit less expensive that still provides the same services. I like the place because it's close to the church that we go to, it's almost walking distance, and it's close to the Navy Exchange. I'm a retired navy and shop there for what we need. It's also not too far from my house. However, I'm a retired navy and government employee, and all my pension just goes into this place. My wife sleeps in the bedroom. There's a living room next to it, and that's where I sleep.
They have all kinds of activities here, and the rooms are good. They have an exercise room, which I use a lot. My wife is really the one that needs the care. I'm just staying with her because sometimes, especially at night, they only have two or three caregivers for the whole building. My wife would need to go to the bathroom constantly, in the middle of the night, because she has a hyperactive bladder. If I am not here, nobody would take her to the bathroom. Sometimes I give her the shower myself and attend to her clothes and dress her in the nightgown to go to sleep. They do that here, that's one of their amenities, but they are just sort of short-staffed during the night, and sometimes even during the day. The staff is very respectful and patient, but just short-handed. If three or four patients are needing help at the same time, and there's only one person who's taking care of them, it would be impossible to take care of all of them at the same time.
The amenities are outstanding. They have a beauty salon, a library, and a bar. Next to the dining room, there is a big patio that is open. When my sister and her husband came over to visit, they accommodated us over there. My sister brought their own food and they were able to eat at the big table there. They call that place the sunroom.
Provider Response
Many thanks for taking the time to comment. You are of course correct as to almost all your comments. Assisted living is not inexpensive, though if eligible for VA Aid and Attendance the out of pocket is significantly less. The cost of assisted living (whether Anthem Lakes or others) is largely driven by the substantial staffing requirements, so searching for a meaningfully less community generally implies a substantially lower staffing level. Thank you for noting the amenities are good, the activities are good, and staff being respectful and patient. As regards staffing levels, we have always -- and still -- staff well in excess of state requirements. Your being able to assist sometimes is of course loving, and I might note that the only realistic way to completely solve that concern is to consider hiring 24 hour private care which would be greatly more expensive. I do not recall Anthem Lakes ever having a resident leave because care was not proper, and we are state deficiency free. Conversely, we have on a number of occasions had a resident leave to get a lower monthly charge, and most of these have then returned to us fairly quickly. Among the firms like Caring.com this community Anthem Lakes is very well known for the high quality of care. We do record and track response times and care quite a lot about that metric. Should you depart, we wish you well -- but of course hope you will inquire in detail about both nighttime staffing levels and nighttime response times before making that decision. We are confident by those metrics Anthem Lakes will show very well indeed.
