Belmont Village

loved guide.

Special memory care support within Assisted Living

3 meals/day w/ no assigned seating; exercise equip; small studio.

Very nice facility.

Very nice accommodations and amenities. No Wifi. No swimming pool and limited exercise facilities. Excellent food in dining room. Some availability of food delivery. Grounds are nice but very small. Close to large park. High cost for accomodations, would not be able to afford anything larger than a studio, which is not very pleasing to me.

This place is great, but assisted living is focus; could be independent, but average age again was said to be 75-80 - seemed a bit older - (range was said to be from ~65-100). Has a variety of amenities (pool, jacuzzi, exercise/fitness room, computer lab/room). Their dining area looks more like a restaurant than a dining room. Of course, the price goes with it. Larger hotel-shuttle-style van for transportation.

Not the right place for mom. Units only have kitchenettes. Rooms are very small. Seems to be more for asst. living

The director was a great guide. Very nice place, but felt like a nursing home. Did not love the room setup.

Very nice.

okay-

May be it is a good facility for caring and services but I had called several times to reach out the case manager or facility manager in the Woodward area to ask some questions and the staff is replying she is very busy and can't answer to my question. How good it will be for the client?

We moved my mom here when she started needing help to take a shower and go to the bathroom due to stability issues and we didn't want her to fall. The place is beautifully maintained and they are undergoing renovations of each of the apartments. The marketing people are really a lot better than the product they have to market. When my mom needed assistance the help was often unpleasant, didn't smile, acted like she was a burden to them, especially the night person, of which there was only one for the whole floor. One of the day people was not a good match for my mom and we asked to have a different person assigned to her. They removed the old person, but forgot to assign someone else so my mother was on her own for a day and a half before management discovered they didn't assign anyone, but that is after all of her children pointed it out to them. My mom had to paddle herself in her wheelchair to get her medicines or she would have missed the schedule completely. I'm not sure how long it would have taken for them to discover that she didn't get her medicines. There is no central system through which to coordinate the personnel and make sure that when a call goes out by a resident, that it is actually answered. No one answered my mom for a day and a half even though they heard it on the system over and over, because it wasn't coming from their room number assignment. We only allowed this to go on for about six weeks and then moved my mom again only this time to a senior living facility with caregivers that we interviewed and hired. In the end this turned out be a more affordable option getting her exactly the care she needs. We expected for $10,000/month to get exceptional care. I would definitely not recommend this place for anyone who is unable to advocate for themselves. The struggle was real!

Facility is clean , well maintained and the managing staff is very nice and helpful. Many of the caretakers are as well, however, they don't provide the attention and level of care promised and most of the staff are not as well trained as they should be to deal with dementia and Alzheimer's residents. They tend to disappear for long periods of time during meals and I have witnessed several use inappropriate tones and words with residents. Sadly, it is at times when they do not know families are present. Even though the costs for the facility are high, in order to ensure the proper care and attention, most families also employ private caregivers. This was a disappointment.

Belmont does many things VERY well. The activities for the Memory Care residents are excellent and appropriate for the level of the resident. The food and dining staff are excellent as is the cleanliness and overall appearance of the facility. It's beautiful. The Care Services are disappointing. We were told the ratio of caregivers to residents was 12:1. Once in the facility, the ratio is 25:1. This is not enough to care for residents with dementia. They recommend hiring their Private Caregivers for one-on-one assistance. These 'Private Pals' are adequate but not what I'd expect from a facility at this price point. Caregivers/Private Pals routinely work double shifts. Communication needs improvement. Both the communication between caregivers on different shifts and communication with the family. This is probably an exceptional place for Assisted Living. For Memory Care (Alzheimers, Dementia, etc.) emphasis needs to be placed on the personal care they give the residents...and this is simply adequate.

It's a great place ONLY if you are living in the independent side, now if you are living in the dementia care unit is horrible!!! [removed] You can pull the cord and they will not respond for hours. What could you expect of the staff with more responsibility is getting paid minimum. My grandmother's room was filthy until I had to bring it to the staffs attention.

It’s a relatively small, older facility and only a small studio room was available to see. The staff were very helpful and provided all the info I needed. Given a variety of factors including cost, facilities, and availability I don’t think it’s a good match.

My 103 year old mother has been at Belmont Calabasas for over 3 years. Overall it has been and continues to be good for her. However, there are significant lapses in service, so at 103 sometimes she calls for help from an employee, and the stated policy is that person responds within 10 minutes, but the response time greatly exceeds that much too frequently. Always excuses for why that happens. This morning, my mother waited 90 minutes with no response, she then contacted my wife who called to inquire. Someone then came to her room quickly and while helping my mother let her know that her PAL (title of employee who helps her) didn't show up today. Obviously not acceptable, and if this was a one off, then things happen, move on, etc., but these unacceptable delays are very frequent. Very frustrating for us, but imagine how it feels if you are 103 year old and have a feeling of helplessness.

I am paying much more than I am getting in return. Its very hard to get staff to communicate with resident reps, children or health care surrogates. I was so excited to move Mom here but my expectations have not been lived up to. They sell a good story but its pretty much a fairytale.

The main reason that I put overall experience and quality of care as a 2 is because the facility has very bad communication, overstated their capabilities and did not proactively administer pain medicine before events that they know would cause pain. They will tell you that they have capabilities that they don't actually have. I was told they knew how to use a slide board. My mom got there and everyone was just looking at her because they didn't know how to transfer her with a slide board. The facility didn't even own one. How could you train your people on using a slide board if the facility doesn't own one? I ended up ordering one overnight on Amazon, but ultimately they ended up using a hoyer lift. My mom had bad back pain and the facility didn't plan ahead to give pain medicine before any transfers or changes. She would be screening in pain. They were also supposed to keep a brace on her when in a wheel chair. Many times I would come and see her in a chair without a brace and in pain. (Bad communication). There was a time that my mom's medicine was changed. The computer system in my mom's wing had the old medicine deleted, but the new pain medicine was not added. My mom was in pain and I went to get the nurse to give her pain medicine and they told me that her pain medicine was stopped. After I made a fuss about it and called the hospice service and they called them to verify that my mom was still supposed to get pain medicine, but a different dose, the nurse had said it was updated in one part of their system, but not the terminal on my moms wing. My mom also had a catheter to drain her urine. I caught it being restricted under her leg or not draining correctly, but no one noticed except me and my mom was in pain since urine was not draining correctly. I would say the facility would be fine if the resident didn't have any serious medical issues such as needing a catheter or back pain issues. When they assess whether to bring a person in, it seems like they just want the person in to get the money, even if the resident is beyond their capability. I also had billing issues each bill. They always overcharged significantly. They would always fix the bill, but this was an extra headache I didn't want to deal with with my mom being in bad shape. Some nurses were very good ([name removed] was a great nurse), while others were not on top of pain medicine. I had to be on top of this. If I wasn't there so much, I think half of them would have left my mom in pain.

The staff is not trained on how to take care of elderly dementia residents., but the cleanliness is their saving grace. A smile and a hello go a long way the staff does neither. Mom is left in her room by herself for hours at a time which I was told would never happen. My kids school lunches were better nutritionally and had better product quality. There are few to none. I've only seen mom once in the activity room. Considering the quality of care and meals. The only reason she is there is because Belmont is grandfathered in for 2 person assist. No other facilities that I liked and looked at in Oak Park / River Forest could accept her.