Park West Care Center

We have had two separate stays at Park West and both times have been disappointed with the care received. After our first experience we tried going to another facility but unfortunately it was full so we decided to give Park West another try and that turned out to be a mistake. It seems that staff have very little training and on our second visit we did not recognize one single staff member from our previous stay. The impact of high turnover of staff and lack of training was evident. Long call wait times and several clothing items were lost as staff weren't aware clothing needed to be labelled before sending it to the laundry. The worst moment was when my husband was almost given the wrong medication as the nurse mistook him for the wrong patient. Scary. No apology other than the excuse he doesn't normally work here.

My husband was admitted on 11/6 for rehab due to a broken back. The staff has been amazing, although at night and on weekends the floor is chronically understaffed. The call light is frequently not answered for half an hour or more. The food is excellent, although with a limited menu. He cannot eat beef, and has a severe allergy to certain foods, I personally saw both served to him for a meal. The kitchen staff didn't seem to "get" his special needs, the alternative to what they wanted to give to him for a meal being a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, or chicken salad sandwich. Our repeated requests for add'l options were ignored. We also noticed a number of personal items went missing, even though the staff was notified, nothing was done to replace the items. The rehab staff is awesome and would recommend them to anyone and everyone. Bottom line, a pretty good facility, no weird smells, nice area in safe surroundings.

I spent 5 weeks in this facility for physical and occupational therapy for a broken pelvis and a broken elbow. Nurses are frequently worked more than 12-hour shifts. They are often so fatigued that they make medication errors. The floor I was on was often unstaffed at night. I entered the facility with an entire sealed wound-care kit, and an open kit. Tiny pieces from the open kit were used on me, because the wound was nearly healed. When I left, the sealed kit was not returned to me, "because they had used it on other people who needed it" I was told. The Physical and Occupational Rehab departments were competent, but understaffed. I have since met therapists who said they would not work in this facility because of unreasonable management demands. Management claimed to be a Medicare 5-Star facility, but when I explored on the internet, this was not true. Their Dietary department had been given 5 Stars several years before my stay, for cleanliness. It appears that Management people have no Gerontology credentials.

My father received adequate care during his stay at Park West Care Center after he had a stroke although there were times when it took a long time for nursing staff to respond to his call light. They seem to be frequently understaffed, and this leads to patients being neglected when they are soiled and not always getting their medications in a timely fashion. The appearance of the facility is very clean, and they have a very spacious cafeteria with great food. The rehab team is excellent as they provided my father with both physical therapy and occupational therapy services. Physical therapy did a wonderful job in helping him to regain his ability to walk and balance. Occupational therapy really helped him to learn different adaptive techniques for dressing and bathing to help increase his independence with his daily activities. I would recommend this facility to other future patients based on our experience with the rehab department alone.

Park West is located in the tree-lined neighborhood of North Admiral, in West Seattle. All the staff I met on our visit was kind, considerate and thorough in their interactions with patients. The activities director is especially outgoing and organizes musical groups to visit, children to present art work to hang on the walls and also visiting artists to work with patients. The facility was clean with an overall positive feeling from the patients we met. We visited at dinner time and the staff provided for the comfort of the patients and assisted those in need with food. Younger folks in need of rehabilitation services were also patients at the time we visited which gave the facility a youthful tone. Most caregivers were youthful - and we noticed younger and older folks playing board games together which seemed very sweet. Several outside areas are available to patients which include seating so that they can have fresh air and enjoy the planting and trees that surround the facility.