Assisted Living Community Sued for Deathly Bus Crash

Here's a story that appeared the other day in the Washington Post. It does show why long-term care facilities and companies need to be on the lookout for putting themselves into bad situations. This story involves a bus crash with residents forced to leave a nursing home due to Hurricane Rita. Thus as you read it, you'll see that sometimes assisted living communities and nursing homes are swept up in things that aren't entirely their fault.

Public Still Distrusts Long Term Care

Caring the the Ages Magazine's September, 2005 issue has a short story on the Kaiser Family Foundation's recent report that the long term care industry still needs to improve its reputation with the public:

In a comparison of public perceptions of health care sectors, nursing homes rank below pharmaceutical companies in the percentage of Americans who say they are doing a "good job" serving patients or consumers.

This probably isn't surprising to the long term care industry itself, which is acutely aware of how the media drives the the perceptions of the public. The industry needs to continue to combat this negative perception.