From our house to “God’s house”

Categories: In The News, National Media Items

Over the last decade, the medical practice of elder care has come to recognize the importance of well-designed housing as foundational to the well-being of the elderly. Leading geriatrics doctors such as Dr. Bill Thomas have founded initiatives such as the Eden Alternative and the Green House Project which recognize that “human well-being” encompasses more than what is clinically measurable. These initiatives have brought a semblance of autonomy and a sense of “home” back to these elderly facilities. The concept of de-clinicalizing end-of-life care and understanding the need for elderly residences to have a home have become a driving vision for recent work in geriatrics and hospice care.

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  • There’s already a waiting list for Navigator Homes, which will be the Island’s first care facility to follow the Green House Model of Nursing Home Care. At Navigator Homes in Edgartown, the five buildings surround a central green space, where landscaping plans include walking paths connecting the residences. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is financing the buildings’ construction. 

  • Evidence-based culture change partners provide professionals with supportive, interdisciplinary training.  “We need as many Green Houses as possible and households or buildings to be built with wise investment of public and private dollars,” Anne Montgomery said. “The EINSTEIN Option calls for this to happen and lays out a blueprint for it.”

  • “If we’re going to elevate the resident’s voice, we’ve got to include residents,” said Laci Cornelison, interim director of the Center on Aging at Kansas State University and coalition member, during her session at Pioneer Network and The Green House Project’s 2024 Conference on Wednesday. “We really wanted to take an approach where we’re looking at things through the lens of culture change and person-centered care. We focus mostly on quality of life rather than clinical needs.”

  • “At a time when hospitals continued to push more post-surgical patients straight to home care, Londonderry Village in Palmyra, PA, decided to invest in six Green House homes with 10 beds each. ‘We believed in that culture and that quality of care,’ said President and CEO Jeff Shireman. ‘People have great experiences in that environment.'”