Lake Mead Health and Rehabilitation Center

I have my grandfather placed in Henderson Healthcare Center. He’s not and I’m not happy with the facility. My grandfather has Alzheimer's, and I don’t think that they do all they can to help as far as trying to keep his memory fresh and reminding him of little things like his snacks. Their communication is terrible. Trying to get them to cooperate in things that I need to get done for my grandfather is very difficult. They requested that I let them set up transportation for his doctor’s appointments, and he missed 6 appointments until I’ve said enough is enough and that I’ll take him myself. They have a few nurses there that are nice. They try to be as helpful as they can within their job, but I’ve been completely less than impressed with the place. There’s a horrible odor. The location is OK; it’s not too far out in Henderson. There is a hospital probably 2 miles off the road and a mall probably 5 miles away. When you go look into the facility, they’re not exactly truthful on the process of things and what will happen as far as insurances or Medicaid, things like that.

I went to visit my grandmother in this facility in December. The facility was clean but older and quite drab. There was a strange smell in the hallways that I cannot describe. My biggest disappointment at this facility was the lack of supervision. My grandmother has severe mental issues, and when we went to visit we were basically able to walk in completely unnoticed and she was not looked in on for the entire three hours we visited. My grandmother knew the elevator code (she lives on the second floor) and she basically had free rein to go anywhere on the grounds. She even followed us to the car at one point and could have left that moment with no one to stop her. The lack of security astounded me. Although there were plenty of staff roaming the hallways, as I passed rooms I did not see any member of the staff helping or checking on patients.

At first the facility looks nice, clean, and professional. However, once I entered and wandered around the grounds, my opinion changed drastically. The entire building was older, dirty, and not kept up well. The floors were stained and chipped. The walls were stained and dirty. The elevators were ancient and made horrible noises which frightened the patients. The staff was unfriendly and basically useless. They seemed very uncaring and jaded, almost as if they were told to be mean to the residents. I watched nurses and assistants sitting around gossiping and bad-mouthing patients while some patients were in need of attention. There was one floor that only housed the very mentally ill. It was locked and the patients were suppose to be given the utmost attention. Several times when I visited I found several of those patients either outside on the curb or wandering elsewhere in the buildings. Once again, the staff was too busy talking or eating to notice. Many patients complained about the lack of attention, the service, and especially the food. Not that it should be from a gourmet kitchen, but it should be edible. Many times the food was a mystery, inedible, tasteless or too rubbery to eat. I used to take my aunt food to eat because she couldn't eat anything the staff brought to her. For a facility that is suppose to be taking care of the elderly, there was no empathy and dirty floors.