What has changed and what has remained the same?
HUBBELL -- For 50 years, Our Lady of Mercy Nursing and Rehab Center in Hubbell has been caring for residents.
The health care field has evolved tremendously in the last half decade. Since 1960, much has changed at Our Lady of Mercy, but one thing remains the same.
"It's very important to keep the family together. If the family can do the job, they're hired," says Melvina Dube, who's the third generation of her family to own Our Lady of Mercy.
"That's why we use the slogan, 'It's our family taking care of yours'," says Jerry Schmitt, the administrator, who's also in the family.
And it's really always been that way. Right now, of its 78 employees, 18 are related.
"Even our state surveyors, when they come in here, they say soon as they walk in the door, they can tell it's just a family atmosphere in here," Schmitt says.
Since 1993, Our Lady of Mercy has been Medicare-certified, so its role as a nursing home has changed a little. In its early days, it specialized in 24-hour nursing care for patients who weren't healthy enough to live at home. Now, Our Lady of Mercy is more about rehabilitation.
"They'd go to the hospital, get treated, get stabilized, and then they would come here where we would take over the therapy part of it, get them back, get their strength back up, get them walking, and get them back into their home environment," Schmitt explains.
"I think we're doing a very good job with our residents right now," Dube says. "I think we should always look forward. Sometimes, the state and Federal rules are a little stringent, but it's for the good of all the residents."
Our Lady of Mercy's 65 beds are typically full, and the staff says that patient morale is always very high.
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