A Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF) has registered nurses who provide 24 hour care for persons in residential areas and generally on long term basis for themselves due to physical, emotional, or mental conditions. These SNF facilities specialize in 24 hour care and monitoring of persons whose needs are normally so critical where they need constant monitoring, but not so sever, where hospitalization is required.
The staff at SNF is ready to help people with their routine daily living activities such as dressing, bathing, meals etc, though, person(s) are encouraged to do all this as much for themselves as they can, to assist them keep up their own independence. Services that are offered by such SNF include, but are not limited to: meals, laundry, housekeeping, therapies, transportation, religious activities and other daily activities.
Most nursing homes have two types of basic services: Skilled Medical Care and Custodial Care.
Skilled Medical Care consists of the specialized health support required for a specific period of time because of an injury or illness.
- This care is provided by physical therapist
- A speech therapist that helps a person after a stroke
- An occupational therapist that helps someone relearns self-care in areas such as dressing, grooming and eating.
Custodial Care or Personal Care includes help with daily living activities, such as:
- Bathing
- Dressing
- Eating
- Grooming
- Getting in and out of bed, or walking around
- Toileting: Use a toilet and perform associated personal hygiene
Custodial care is required to those who lose their ability to function independently.
Many times, it is hard to differentiate the skilled medical care and custodial care. However, the main difference between them is the level of care that is available at each facility. Skilled nursing facilities offer a much wider range of health services to people and include more specialized health care professionals such as therapists, gerontologists etc. Custodial care may be a long term need for those people who are not able to function independently due to chronic disease and increased frailty. Whether a person is under skilled or custodial care, it is important in terms of who provides the care and who pays for the services provided.
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