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At the Graceful Senescence adult day healthcare center in South Los Angeles, the average day is filled with music, art classes and exercise. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times) |
At 10 a.m. sharp, the central room at the Golden Age center started thumping with rap music. Staff members scurried around, urging everyone to set aside their cards and conversation.
"Exercise time! Exercise time!" the activity coordinator shouted as she began marching in place. "Up, up! Arriba, arriba!"
Gilberto Hernandez wheeled himself to the front of the room and took his place in a semicircle of wheelchairs. His left arm remained limp, but he lifted his right arm into the air and moved it in circles to the beat.
Hernandez, a former construction worker left partially paralyzed by a stroke and heart attack 12 years ago, needs help eating, bathing, changing and going to the bathroom. Each weekday, he and about 130 others spend several hours at the Golden Age Adult Day Health Care Center in Lynwood.
"When I am here and listen to the music, I forget about my problems at home," Hernandez, 48, said with a slur. "In my home I feel very alone."
Hernandez isn't the only one who relies on the center, decorated with brightly colored balloons and Valentine's Day coloring sheets. While he is here, his wife, Emiliana, gets a brief respite from her duties as his caretaker.
Under the most recent cost-saving budget proposals, 327 adult day healthcare centers throughout California would be eliminated. Cuts could save the state $135 million in fiscal 2011, state projections show.
But advocates and center operators said care for many of the 37,000 low- income participants -- who suffer from diabetes, brain injuries, dementia and other chronic conditions -- would cost the state even more money if the centers close. More than 40% of participants would end up in nursing homes, said Lydia Missaelides, executive director of the California Assn. for Adult Day Services. Others would be hospitalized.
Missaelides and nearly 20 others testified at a recent state Senate budget committee hearing in Sacramento against the elimination of the centers, which could occur as early as March 1.
"We are taking this extremely seriously," she said. "We are in as much danger as we have ever been."
Medi-Cal pays the vast majority of a center's care costs, which run about $76 per person per day, Missaelides said. The average age of a participant is 78, but centers serve centenarians as well as people in their 20s. All centers have nurses, dietitians, social workers and occupational, speech and physical therapists.
Eliminating adult day healthcare services would affect family members as well as participants, operators said.
"They would have to figure out how to take care of their family members," said Cástulo de la Rocha, chief executive of AltaMed Health Services Corp., which runs Golden Age and seven other centers in Southern California. "It would impact their jobs."
Emiliana Hernandez said her husband is more relaxed and less depressed after spending the day at the center.
At Golden Age, he sings, dances, plays bingo, attends church and chats with his friends -- activities that take his mind off his life before becoming disabled.
Closing the center, Gilberto Hernandez said, "would ruin me."
He dabbed the drool on the side of his mouth with a towel tucked into his shirt as he prepared for a physical therapy session. Therapist Charlie Evans maneuvered the wheelchair in between two bars and braced herself so she could help Hernandez lift himself up.
"You ready?" she said. "Take your time. One . . . two . . . three. Lift. Breathe in. Breathe out.
"Good! You got to do that four more times," she said. "It will help you stand up for your wife."
"Exercise time! Exercise time!" the activity coordinator shouted as she began marching in place. "Up, up! Arriba, arriba!"
Gilberto Hernandez wheeled himself to the front of the room and took his place in a semicircle of wheelchairs. His left arm remained limp, but he lifted his right arm into the air and moved it in circles to the beat.
Hernandez, a former construction worker left partially paralyzed by a stroke and heart attack 12 years ago, needs help eating, bathing, changing and going to the bathroom. Each weekday, he and about 130 others spend several hours at the Golden Age Adult Day Health Care Center in Lynwood.
"When I am here and listen to the music, I forget about my problems at home," Hernandez, 48, said with a slur. "In my home I feel very alone."
Hernandez isn't the only one who relies on the center, decorated with brightly colored balloons and Valentine's Day coloring sheets. While he is here, his wife, Emiliana, gets a brief respite from her duties as his caretaker.
Under the most recent cost-saving budget proposals, 327 adult day healthcare centers throughout California would be eliminated. Cuts could save the state $135 million in fiscal 2011, state projections show.
But advocates and center operators said care for many of the 37,000 low- income participants -- who suffer from diabetes, brain injuries, dementia and other chronic conditions -- would cost the state even more money if the centers close. More than 40% of participants would end up in nursing homes, said Lydia Missaelides, executive director of the California Assn. for Adult Day Services. Others would be hospitalized.
Missaelides and nearly 20 others testified at a recent state Senate budget committee hearing in Sacramento against the elimination of the centers, which could occur as early as March 1.
"We are taking this extremely seriously," she said. "We are in as much danger as we have ever been."
Medi-Cal pays the vast majority of a center's care costs, which run about $76 per person per day, Missaelides said. The average age of a participant is 78, but centers serve centenarians as well as people in their 20s. All centers have nurses, dietitians, social workers and occupational, speech and physical therapists.
Eliminating adult day healthcare services would affect family members as well as participants, operators said.
"They would have to figure out how to take care of their family members," said Cástulo de la Rocha, chief executive of AltaMed Health Services Corp., which runs Golden Age and seven other centers in Southern California. "It would impact their jobs."
Emiliana Hernandez said her husband is more relaxed and less depressed after spending the day at the center.
At Golden Age, he sings, dances, plays bingo, attends church and chats with his friends -- activities that take his mind off his life before becoming disabled.
Closing the center, Gilberto Hernandez said, "would ruin me."
He dabbed the drool on the side of his mouth with a towel tucked into his shirt as he prepared for a physical therapy session. Therapist Charlie Evans maneuvered the wheelchair in between two bars and braced herself so she could help Hernandez lift himself up.
"You ready?" she said. "Take your time. One . . . two . . . three. Lift. Breathe in. Breathe out.
"Good! You got to do that four more times," she said. "It will help you stand up for your wife."
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