The Blake at Oxford

For "Assisted Living", this may be ok, but NOT for "Memory Care". This place can be deceiving. We thought it was great for about 8 months. We now know, that it was great because my mom was easy and was helping and probably because there were still some good, caring caregivers there. After about 8 months, during my visits, my mom would say things like "people don't like me", "she hates me" , "yes, let's go somewhere" and would be teary more when I left. I equated it with...it's just the disease talking (because I hadn't noticed much different in the facility. I hadn't seen some of the caregivers that I was used to seeing, but I figured I was just missing them due to schedules changing) Over the next 2 months, I started getting calls from them saying that Mom was having issues..she was hurting, or not taking her medicine and they wanted me to come help, or that she was being aggressive. Being new to all of this AND trusting them, I thought it was all Mom's fault. But, I also wondered why they told us they could take care of Alzheimer's residents, if they were calling me and having problems with her. During these couple of months: They sent her to a doctor to check her out when she was sick...I found out later that they NEVER checked her for a UTI (which is very important and changes behavior in Alzheimer's....AND SHE HAD a UTI b/c I took her to the ER a few days later and was told she had a bad one), she was getting mad at men (but they kept coming into her room...but of course the men didn't really know what they were doing b/c they had Alz also...but the workers should have taken care of that...not my mom having to yell at the men), Mom went without her meds for 2-3 days because the pharmacy was out of it (and I didn't know it!), Mom was blamed for pushing down her friend when NO ONE saw it (they just assumed it, since they were already frustrated with her), she began having bowel movement issues in her pants, they sent her to behavior management b/c they said she was being aggressive (when we took her to the ER again so that she could be admitted to the behavior management...we found out that she had another UTI). When she got back from there, about a week later, that NEXT day...they called and told me that we had to move her bc she was still aggressive. By the way, whenever I was there, which was several times a week, I NEVER saw her being aggressive...I DID see her get an angry face and telling a nurse to "Get Out". While trying to get her into another facility, we found out through other people there at The Blake...that a lot of the things they were blaming Mom for made no sense to them and I was asked, by an outside caregiver for someone else who had been to The Blake many, many times and had interacted with Mom when she came, she asked me... "What have they done to your mom? She is NOT the same person." Also, we started piecing things together (again, we had trusted this place for months...so we were believing them....instead of realizing what was happening). When we had another place come evaluate Mom at The Blake...we learned that The Blake needed to do better training of it's staff. They were fussing and yelling at residents when we weren't there to see it happening. The last weeks there, we paid more attention to things and realized that we had been too trusting. Once we moved my mom to a new place...she was much happier. The staff and caregivers at her new place say that they have NEVER EVER seen her be aggressive. At her new place, they interact more with the residents, they hug and make the residents smile. It makes me so sad and so angry that we didn't realize that our mom was being mistreated and not taken care of as we had thought. Yes, some of the workers there were good...but too many were NOT. They were NOT trained well, not supervised well....and at the top...I found she lied to me. Also, the Assisted Living side is where they seem to place the importance and just tend to forget about the Memory Care side. Unless things have changed A LOT, in the last 5 months there, DO NOT be deceived by the outward appearance...it's NOT a good place if your loved one actually needs help.

The Blake at Oxford was very nice. The people who worked there were very nice and knew everyone by name. The rooms were all private, a little tiny, but nice. Everything was clean. They have games and they take people on errands uptown. They also have snacks out for residents. The place is very secure and you have to have a code to get in and out.