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Gilbert Guide: Then & Now
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We’ve come a long way in the last couple of years. Gilbert Guide has always existed to help meet the needs of families across the country. But recently, I’ve done a lot of reflecting on how the direction has shifted since we entered the senior care market.
Gilbert Guide was created with the purpose of providing the only unbiased reviews of all long-term care facilities and services. We started the company with the vision of Gilbert Guide being a kind of “recommendation center.” The basic question we tried to answer for individuals and families across the country was this: “Where can I find the best care to fit my needs?” It was a very simple question—one with an infinite amount of answers.
Each and every family has a unique scenario. There was no way we could come up with only one solution for everyone. We had to find the common denominator. Ultimately, we found that there was one crucial thing: quality care. It’s the most important thing when it comes to leading a healthy life. Not only that, quality of care directly relates to quality of life. We discovered that it doesn’t matter if it’s in the home or in a facility—quality is the one factor that rises above all others in determining what type of care you want for yourself or your loved ones.
There are endless amounts of Web sites and services that claim to help you find the right care and navigate the maze of senior care options. At first glance, every one of these sites looked impressive—that is, until I delved beneath the surface. I asked myself, how can these companies claim to guide people in the right direction while:
- Taking monies from the facilities they are referring people to? Doing so creates a bias on the part of the company that’s making a profit—there’s a clear conflict here if they’re claiming that their consumers’ needs come first.
- Repackaging government deficiency reports that are FREE to the public, and then charging for this “new” information? One of the biggest problems with this is not even that people are being charged—it’s that the companies don’t explain what the deficiencies mean—and what a small slice of the pie they represent.
- Claiming that they have holistic profiles of long-term care facilities and services without ever having conducted interviews or in-person visits? This, in my opinion, is a completely hollow claim.
As we have progressed through the months and years, our scope has gotten wider and wider as we’ve strived to meet the many needs of our diverse audience. While the scope has grown, however, our focus has become more and more targeted. So what have we learned?
- Most people don’t prepare for their retirement and potential long-term care needs until they’re faced with a crucial trigger event.
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There are so many questions surrounding the process of growing old—here’s a tiny sampling of questions that come to mind:
- What is hospice and how does it work? What’s the difference between hospice and palliative care?
- How can I afford assisted living? How can I afford to have someone care for me at home? I don’t want my children to pay for it.
- What if I run out of money? What does Medicare pay for? Should I prepare for Medicaid? How do I prepare for Medicaid?
- I live across the country and won’t be able to care for my parents. What should I do?
- Should I take in my mom and care for her? What about my job?
- There are literally hundreds—if not thousands—of websites claiming to help. How do consumers know which one to trust? How do they begin to weed through all of the possibilities?
- No one has truly developed a set of standards and criteria for many of the types of care: homecare, geriatric care management, assisted living, etc. More importantly, the real people choosing the care don’t know how to assess these facilities and services. And why should they know how? Many people go to school for years to be able to do this.
After looking at the breadth of the issues people are facing, I had one clear question: how does Gilbert Guide best serve the community? This is what I came up with. Gilbert Guide must:
- Play a crucial role in helping families create a quality life for their senior loved ones.
- Assist families in figuring out the kind of care they need, knowing that everyone needs something a little different
- Provide an informational conduit, connecting the public with the experts—and making it easy for our audience to learn and get trusted advice
This is a huge challenge, but one I am personally very excited to take on. We will continue to listen and respond to our audiences’ needs. I will constantly step back, observe and re-evaluate when necessary. Our policy has always been open-door—and our new Web site and blog are allowing even more lines of communication to be open. I’m looking forward to continuing this conversation and learning how our services can continue to meet your unique needs.
I’d like to pose these questions to you. What’s most important to you? What can Gilbert Guide do to support you?
Here’s to making it better...
Jill Gilbert
Posted in: Gilbert Guide News
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Louise,
What a helpful suggestion. There is nothing more difficult than having to figure out which facility is best for your loved one and especially in a time crunch. It’s amazing how many things we forget to ask and clarify before we “sign on the dotted line.”
It sounds like this is a phenomenal resource. Were you able to utilize the book or did someone recommend it to you?
When I first began visiting nursing homes and assisted living facilities, I had no idea how to truly assess quality. I, of course, looked at how ‘pretty’ each place was, but I soon learned that it wasn’t a great indication about the quality of care one would receive. That’s really how Gilbert Guide came to be.
It was written from the standpoint of someone who didn’t know ANYTHING about finding quality care facilities and services - like me!
Thanks for taking the time to point this out to us. Much appreciated….Jill