Brightly Senior Living – Glen Carbon

Doris

Brightly Senior Living - Glen Carbon has very roomy two-bedroom, two-bath apartments, which is what we would prefer to find. The downside there was the menu. I have high cholesterol that I have to keep down with medication and diet, and I found their menu did not adhere to a low-fat diet. Maybe my low-fat diet is more extreme than usual, but regardless, it has to fit both my sister and me. We both have pets, and we would like to take them with us, but Brightly wanted a $750 deposit, plus they wanted a fee of $150 a month per pet, and I have two pets. That policy is nowhere competitive with the other places that we are looking at. In the independent apartments, there is no stove and no microwave. You have to supply your own microwave. The lack of a kitchen range kind of did it for me. That was the big reason that Brightly was eliminated from the competition. The staff was excellent, very friendly, and answered all our questions. They showed us all of the facility that we were interested in seeing. I would rate them highly. The menu was just a disappointment to me. The choices were very limited, and I didn't think that they were low-fat either. The facility was good. The residents we spoke to seemed to be happy where they were. I didn't hear any complaints from them, but I was limited in how many I spoke to. We were touring with one of the employees, so if they had any dissatisfaction, they might be hesitant to mention it in front of her. I only saw parking around the front part of the building. I didn't see that it was crowded as far as the ability to park, but that could be a disadvantage if your residence was on the back side and you had to walk around the building to get to your car. If you have difficulty walking, that may be a problem for you.

Stacey

My father-in-law was put in Brightly Senior Living in Glen Carbon, and I cannot recommend them to anyone. He was on the memory care side, and it's a beautiful place. It's absolutely gorgeous. He was there for one and a half months. The apartment was pretty, large, and comfortable. The one issue we had was that the bathroom door and the closet door are identical, and he kept getting them confused. He would think the closet was the bathroom, and sometimes the bathroom was the closet, and that posed a problem. They're understaffed, and to be blunt, they do not do a whole lot for the residents. We spent a lot of time there because they said they could not handle my father-in-law, so we would go there and we'd spend the whole day with him. We'd have to help get him into bed at night. He did have issues, and we understood that because he was in memory care. However, there were times when six out of seven days they'd be calling us for help. Sometimes we would get there, and he'd be sitting in the main community area, just watching TV, so we didn't understand why we continually kept getting called. They have an activity director, and when I was there, I witnessed her come into the memory care side, go into her activity room, and proceed to start the activity. My mother-in-law, who was sitting with me on this particular day, turned to one of the caretakers and asked what was going on over there. They said it's an activity, so she asked if my father-in-law could go. They said everyone can go, and there were three people in that activity room when my mother-in-law walked over. However, there was no calendar posted, and no information regarding to when activities were held anywhere in that memory care facility. The food was amazing. They didn't provide beverages to any of the residents during the day, other than at meals. One great improvement would be to get rid of the psychiatric physician they use and train their staff to engage with members more. They could also provide more activities for the residents, even if they could do them on their own. They didn't even have any tools for them other than a puzzle. They had a puzzle that was pretty much left out in the open for them to work. They could go into the activity room, but everything was tucked away, and put away, and there were coloring sheets and word searches. A lot of the residents just sat. If they did exercise, it would be the first thing in the morning, and I think it was 15 minutes to half an hour.