Transitioning “home”: Creating culture change within long term care facilities

Increasingly, the concept of observing and maintaining one's dignity during the last phase of one's life in long term care facilities has received attention. There has been a movement in the past ten years to change the model of care at long term care facilities from a medical model to a home/person centered model this movement is referred to as the culture change movement. This study set out to evaluate a culture change initiative within a rural Midwest state by comparing the facilities which have and have not participated in the culture change initiative. A survey entitled The Artifacts of Culture Change was mailed to the administrators of the rural based long term care facilities (N=179). Findings: There was no significance between the six facilities in the program and the others not enlisted in the intervention program Facilities involved in the program tested higher in certain sub areas of the survey when compared to other facilities. The major areas of change included areas associated with activities and the environment. While the results showed that the facilities involved in the program had limited significant differences on the Artifacts of Culture Change Tool when compared with other facilities, it was clear that facilities involved with people who have disabilities were further ahead than most facilities. Conclusion: Principles used within the disability movement should be integrated into the aging care arena and adapted for public health facilities, rules and regulations to improve the environments of long term care facilities for older adults.