Assisted Living and DNR (Do Not Resuscitate)

@ess77, Just as the saying: "each one help one" can make a true difference, your shares, Elizabeth, have given others who follow your posts courage to continue despite the deep disappointments that come when anticipated hope for professional help is lacking or too long in arriving.

Following my first Moderna vacc, it took several days for me to actually believe that what had happened so quickly and unexpectedly had truly happened: I'd actually received more protection from Covid. You must also be feeling stunned that now you have a professional medical partner who will oversee and coordinate your son's health care. So happy that support and help are on the way for you and your special son. Wishing you both the best going forward.

@ess77, Just wanting to know if life is going more smoothly for you and your dear son? How is the new bed working out for you? Are the workers coming to your son's home helping and making a difference for both of you? Have new coordinations with the health providers and doc teams made improvements? I've had you both on my mind and wanted you to know.

@fatherscaregiver, just checking in. How are you and your father doing?

@colleenyoung Good Morning and thank you for asking. He is hanging in there. We started palliative care and looking forward to working with the nurse practitioner. We are trying to tackle his depression and basically making him get involved in his life instead of hiding in his room 24/7. Hoping to see some positives.

My father will be 102 in May. Mom died 2 years ago. He’s mostly deaf and has lost much of his sight. He is in assisted living and adamant about his DNR. Tonight a tech told me his file was marked with what she understood to mean FULL CODE — the OPPOSITE of DNR. I called attention to this with the 2 siblings who are his official medical advocates. Essentially I was told the DNR is in his file and to stop complaining about the facility, as this will only lead to anger and pain. Am I crazy?! Shouldn’t the STAFF understand he has a DNR? If not, then his wishes mean nothing. He could be found unresponsive and they wouldn’t let him go. I thought DNR had to be posted in his living space.

This happened to my eighty year old mother, who was in rehab following a heart attack. A nurse asked her to sign a DNR. Mom told her she wanted to pray about it first. When my brother visited later that day (he is an attorney), he told my mother to throw it away. Mom had eight more good years before she died.

@chadwyck Welcome to Mayo Clinic Connect! You pose an important question, regarding placement of DNR paperwork.

Do your siblings oppose the DNR wishes of your dad? Would that be at the root of causing anger and pain? I wonder if you could discreetly inquire at the facility, how they handle DNR paperwork. From what I was able to look up, this information is ideally placed near the patient. And perhaps the technician you spoke to is misinformed as to the markings on his file.

I will be interested to know what you are able to find out.
Ginger

My 8 siblings have voiced no opposition to the DNR. Dad is not mentally compromised, so makes his own decisions. The facility has responded to say they’ll do better making sure staff understand his wishes. That STILL does not adequately address the issue. So all bets are off if the staff member who finds him one day didn’t have it personally explained to him/her.
The DNR should be POSTED. I don’t understand why that is not done. Even EMS requests that it be posted. This shouldn’t be a fight.

@chadwyck In our family, there was a divide between siblings. Those who honored my dad's wishes for DNR, those who would fight it. Our dad kept his mental faculties right to the end, like your dad is. The rebel in me, if in your position, would make a post to be kept near his bed, perhaps decorated to stand out, that states "DNR" , and then hang it where it can be seen!

I applaud your desire that your dad's wishes be understood and followed through!
Ginger

In our state, we have a MOLST form that tells providers whether my mother, who is in assisted living, wants resuscitation, artificial nutrition, artificial ventilation or even transport to hospital. (I may be missing something else on the form, that is what I remember.) It is bright pink and is posted in her room and a copy is on her desk. She has dementia so I have an invoked proxy and make decisions for her.

She was briefly on hospice and they recommended having the maximum limits on what anyone could to to prolong her life. Because I could then reduce those limitations, but it would be harder to add them in and, for instance, ventilator could be initiated before I could stop it. With the MOLST, the facility always has to call me when they want to send her to the hospital. I have stopped at least two ambulance trips in the last year, one for nosebleed and one for vomiting. But I okayed a trip for inability to breathe due to severe anemia, for which she had infusions. This year, I am not going to do that either.