There's no place like home, but for its 60‐year history, the Mennonite Home in Albany has been striving to make its nursing care facility as much like home as possible for residents.

The Oregon Alliance of Senior and Health Services recently awarded the Mennonite Village with the first‐ever Innovative Program of the Year Award to recognize a program that contributes to a more pleasant, home‐like
environment at the Mennonite Home. Since spring 2006, staff have worked to completely eliminate alarms placed on residents who are at risk of falling from a bed or chair.

"The whole intent of this is to make it more like home, and you don't have alarms going off in your home all the time," said Mennonite Village Vice President of Operations Bob Johnson.

In many nursing care facilities, the use of alarms to monitor the residents is commonplace. But Mennonite Home staff members determined that the alarms actually were more detrimental to residents because of the noise and the restriction on normal movement, and were not successfully reducing falls. So they developed a system that replaces the alarms with more consistent staff interaction.

"It's a matter of getting staff to interact more with residents instead of depending on a machine to do that for them," Johnson said. "It is a much calmer, more pleasant, quieter atmosphere."

As part of the process in evaluating use of the alarms, Mennonite Home Activities Director Stephanie Bates and staff member Kay Kingsberry wore the alarms, known as monotech alarms, while seated in wheelchairs. The two found that the alarms sounded frequently even with slight movement, and made reaching for items impossible. As a result, they restricted their own movement more than they needed in order to prevent the alarms from sounding.

To reduce the agitation that the alarms caused residents, Mennonite Home staff began the program with a small group and gradually expanded it as no increase in falls was observed. As part of the process, staff members spoke with residents and their families about the new program, conducted fall assessments of vulnerable residents and set up ongoing education efforts for employees.

"By presenting this award to the Mennonite Home, we hope that other care communities will take a fresh look at their own common practices and consider whether there may be better ways to address safety and other concerns that enhance, rather than hamper, quality of life for elders," said Ruth Gulyas, the Oregon Alliance's Executive Director. Bates and Kingsberry were present at the Oregon Alliance's annual conference May 19 in Eagle Crest, along with Johnson, to receive the Innovative Program award.

Mennonite Home serves an average of 90 residents and has a 95 bed capacity. The Mennonite Home is one of the continuing care retirement services offered in the Mennonite Village community. Mennonite Village offers active living, congregate apartment living, assisted living, Alzheimer’s and dementia care, in‐home care as well as skilled nursing and rehabilitation care services.