The Residence at Salem Woods

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17 Reviews

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  A Place For Mom

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  SeniorAdvisor.com

One of my relatives moved into Salem Woods but had to move out after only three weeks due to very dangerous and chronic mismanagement of medication by their staff. What’s worse is their blatant attempts to cover this up and blame others for it. We’re now filing complaints with numerous state regulatory and oversight agencies to ensure that The Residence at Salem Woods fixes their many problems. We urge anyone who might need assistance with medications to avoid living at Salem Woods until this is resolved. My relative ended up in respiratory failure after Salem Woods personnel failed to give her critical daily medication for over 3 weeks. First they blamed the patient’s primary care doctor for this, then they blamed the patient instead of taking responsibility. Separately, they admitted their staff failed 10 times in just a 3 week period to log the administration of narcotic pain medication, seriously putting her at risk of receiving a lethal overdose. After we audited their logs, we further discovered that a third medication had not been given for at least 5 days in a row. But when we caught this weeks later and brought it to the attention of the director of nursing, [name removed], she claimed that she spoke to the on duty staff at the time. The staff was then allowed to retroactively log the medication weeks later, claiming that they simply had “forgotten” to log it but “remembered” giving it. Subsequent checking of the medication showed that in fact there remained too much medication in the vial for it to have been administered that many times. My relative complained to the nurse on duty that she was having shortness of breath and wanted to go to the emergency room. Instead of staying with the patient, the nurse ([name removed]) went downstairs and called me to ask what to do. This wasted precious minutes as we found out later. I asked what medications had been given that day. She responded that the medication log from the other nurses was too hard to read so she couldn’t tell. I then had to tell her to call 911 and get back to the room to be with the patient. By then the patient had lost consciousness and needed CPR. She spent the next 2 weeks in and out of hospitals, including ICU where she was intubated. I met with the management of the facility about these issues. They admitted they had issues but offered no actions to remediate them and to date have not addressed the issue with staff. I left the meeting totally dumbfounded and told them they had serious legal and safety liabilities. My relative moved out in [date removed]. When we requested the return of her security deposit, the executive director [name removed] sent my relative a release of liability agreement and stated we would only get the money back if we agreed not to pursue legal action against them. This is extortion on top of what was already terrible injustice to a vulnerable senior citizen who almost died while in their care! There is much more to this incredibly heartbreaking story. I feel terribly for the existing residents of Salem Woods, especially given the Covid related restrictions make it difficult for loved ones to see what’s really going on there. I also feel badly for the many staff who truly seem to care but are managed by people who are incapable taking responsibility for making a safe environment. I feel obligated to speak for the people who can’t and make sure Salem Woods is held responsible.

The respite care was perfect and we had a really good experience with The Residence at Salem Woods. It was a brand new facility, when my father went here they hadn't even been open a year. It was very beautiful.They had amazing staff members and my father loved it, he also had made a lot of friends. My father loved the food here, he also liked that they did open feeding, so you could eat at anytime during the day, there was no schedule. It was more restaurant style. They had ice-cream socials every Friday. I would recommend.

We chose this community because of the staff. They appeared to be concerned and involved with the residents. They stopped to talk to them, interacted with them, and treated them with dignity and respect. I was looking for a comfortable place for my father to be where he wouldn't be just another job, I wanted staff members to be engaged and they fit that bill very well. The room sizes were very large. I have eaten there and the food was very good. I would recommend this The Residence at Salem Woods.