Mom's things being stolen in the nursing home. Has anyone else had this problem?

Forty-five years ago my mother had to place her mom in a nursing home (a fact mom conveniently avoids when telling me how awful I am for doing the same to her - but that's a different thread). It was an awful place but I imagine standard for the time. You know the type as unfortunately some still exist. Permeated with the smell of urine and residents lining the halls just sitting in their wheelchairs - that or all doubled up two or more to a room lying in hospital beds, no furniture of their own - no furniture to speak of for that matter beyond the standard issued uncomfortable chair and a small chest of drawers. Anyhow - grandma's stuff was always being stolen - everything from new nightgowns to the box of candy brought as a gift. Eventually mom quit bringing grandma anything new or nice. Fast forward to 2015. When we moved mom into her NH the head guy said not to bring anything of value - believe me I didn't need to be told. He also said to label everything and gave me a preprinted inventory sheet that also had blank lines for the odd items. I have yet to do the inventory and the only thing I labeled were her hearing aid boxes - which was silly as the boxes have no value but as far as I could tell there was no way to label her very expensive hearing aids - and I Sharpied her flat screen TV, which she never watches. My reason - sheer exhaustion at the time of the move - that and we took nothing else of value. Mom insisted on keeping her purse which has nothing of value in it besides her wallet which is empty besides pictures and her medical card and ID. I didn't want to leave her with the ID but couldn't find a way around it since I'm not the only person taking her out - to dr appointments where they ask for ID at check in. Mom has become obsessed with her purse for some reason - takes it everywhere - it's like she's Queen Elizabeth who carries a hankie, lipstick and dog biscuits in hers. Last week moms wallet went missing - I wasn't overly surprised or even upset for that matter. Other than having to take her to get a new ID which would have been a hassle - no big loss. A few days later the wallet turned up in her sock drawer. To be honest mom could have "taken" the wallet herself as a part of her on-going campaign to get me to move her in at my house. Anyhow - my point, and I do have one - is that I expected theft to happen - sad disposition but a fact in these types of living settings. I also expected my mom to lose things - hence nothing of value in her room. For Christmas I'm giving her a "dementia clock" - it spells out in complete words the day of the week, the complete date with month, date and year along with a large AM or PM display. It was a pricy item that will get the Sharpie treatment. It's a plug in clock and reaching the cord and/or outlet will be difficult so I doubt another resident will "borrow" it. If it goes missing it will likely be by staff. However - if it does get taken I will blame myself - I know better than to have expensive items in her room. My mom has/had a saying for everything in life. I think theft in communal living would fall under "fore warned is fair warned".

Dementia has to be the hardest thing in the world to cope with. Physical issues can be addressed but there seems no way to reason with someone suffering from dementia. I bought my mother a boom box with large buttons, installed a battery and an Italian music CD which I knew she loved. I explained how to use it over and over and over. Two days later she insisted I took it away as it was all in Italian ... she couldn't remember to press the radio button. It's sitting in my home office, still in its box. She had had dementia for very many years but in the last two years of her life there was absolutely no reasoning with her whatsoever.

Weeone, to me missing shoes and slippers wouldn't be enough for me to move my loved one to another facility. The patient would need to re-learn a whole new routine and probably be scared of new faces, new sounds, different food, and new routines. Now if the loved one was receiving bad care, that would have been different.

In my Mom's nursing home, there was a key lock compartment in the closet to place items that one think are valuable. Of course we don't know what is valuable until it is misplaced.

As I stated before, my husband has had 2 pair of slippers (good ones) and one pair of hard sole shoes missing. And I agree with the previous writer - there is no reason why there cannot be better control of this situation. There are not that many patients in my husbands facility and from what I can tell - enough staff to do some sort of check. I am torn between having another "nice" conversation with the director about this or really getting aggressive and firm to the point where.........."either this gets solved or I will make other arrangements." Any opinions appreciated.

Ah you understand the obsessions that some dementia patients do have, imagine dealing with a dozen of such patients all wanting their favorite wearing apparel or whatever. And like one sees on a menu "no substitutions". Sorry I had to laugh about the dog with a rat. My gosh, one needs at lot of patience and a sense of humor. Mine would have been gone after 15 minutes :P

I did notice at the nursing home my Mom was in, at first I thought there was less Staff as the halls were empty except for maybe one nurse/aide, but I eventually saw more than I had thought when I stayed over two nights with my Mom, and I was roaming the halls at 2 in the morning just to stretch my legs. There were quite a few Staff members.

Ah ff I couldn't agree more usually but for people with dementia (and knowing this personally from Mum) whilst they may not have all their ducks in a row so to speak the amount of trouble losing one of those items is 10 times worse than most can imagine. Especially if it then becomes a focal point. Mum couldn't find her blue bed socks (odd you should've mentioned fuzzy socks ff) believe me in the end I turned the house upside down only to find she had stuffed them into he pillow case. She simply would NOT go to bed without them. Well lets put on the purple ones - nope had to be the blue ones.

Ive put them in the wash they are still wet.

I want to see them.

She just would not let it go, pretty much like a dog with a rat. Drove me insane so I do see both points of view.

An as for Lord give me strength - its that old chestnut - less staff on at night - just the time when people with dementia are MORE likely to need support

Now this is just my opinion, I rather have the Staff busy helping the patients than trying to find ownership to someone's pair of fuzzy red socks.

I was curious how the Staff worked with the patients, so I made sure I visited the morning shift, then the afternoon shift, and the night shift. Wow, that sure gave me a better understanding how much work is involved. Example, one day right after dinner was all cleared and the nurses/aides were trying to round up the patients to get them to bed, an hour later I heard one nurse say "Lord, give me strength".....

Imagine being a babysitter and trying to get 30 "youngsters" into their room and getting them ready for bed... and many of them didn't want to go to bed.... but you get them tucked in and before you know it a couple patients have slipped out of their rooms and were roaming the hallways. Rinse, repeat. Whew!! I don't know how the Staff does it.

Oh, another thought for missing items, bring a flashlight and look under the hospital bed. With all the metal and wires under those type of beds, you'd be surprised what you can find because the cleaning staff can't clean under there very well because of the wires, etc. I finally found the remote for the TV in Mom's room.

In my late mother's NH every item that came in was labelled and/or marked with the resident's name in indelible ink. As far as clothing goes it was essential so the laundry staff knew where to return clean clothes.

My mother was something of a clothes horse and her wardrobe and drawers were stuffed. If she couldn't find something she maintained it was stolen and was always asking or me to buy her more clothes. One day, after she said she only had one pair of pants, I went through her closet and drawers, came up with 6 pair of pants plus tops that she had claimed were stolen. They weren't stolen, just everything stuffed in so tight you couldn't find anything. When she passed I spent a whole day and made two trips with my truck loaded, just to clear everything out.

And to make matters worse, if you complain to the staff they will say, 'oh, you know - they have dementia, so you can't believe anything they say.'
(How nice to be able to blame everything on the elderly person.)

I cannot for the life of me understand why the staff can't control this better - I can only assume they are not allotted key workers who know them well and inventories aren't placed in each room so checks can be done periodically and 'excess' stuff removed to an area until it can be allocated back to the person it belongs to.

I know these homes have to make a profit - I get that, but sometimes I see such appalling abuse of the staff and the residents by the management/owners it makes my blood boil. Example that really got me mad was a care home in a large city that employed ONLY staff from the owner's own country the staff had accommodation if you can call it that - they had one room and one bed between 3 of them they topped and tailed it - as one got out and went to work the other got in. What about days off? they didn't get any. Did they speak English - nope none of them did were the residents ethnic? Nope all english - how on earth can that be even minimal care when they can't read a care plan in the language of the country they work in. How can they tell a resident what they are doing or ask for consent if they can't speak the language? Words failed me - I hasten to add this home has been shut down and the owner barred from opening another. Aldo the staff have funnily enough been deported back to their own country.

Don't start me off grrrrrrrrrr

Nearly every time I visit my mother has something new in her room. I ask "What a cute little plush squirrel! Where did you get it?" The answer is almost always, "I don't know." "Was it a bingo prize?" "Maybe. I think so." If it really was someone else's squirrel how would staff or family know? Mom isn't mobile so she definitely doesn't take things from other people's rooms, but if it was sitting in a common area I suppose she might pick it up. These things probably really are bingo prizes, but I'm pointing out the difficulty for staff to keep track of who owns what.

(BTW, we don't label all the plush animals. We are kind of hoping some will go missing!)

This may be ridiculous and crazy, but it is a fact of life. Most places are simply not staffed at a level they can watch out for personal belongings as well as for the residents. Persons with dementia often have no concept of ownership or rather have that of a three-year-old. If I like it, it is mine. This is not malicious -- it is not intended to "steal" and make someone else unhappy.

I made my mother a fleece blanket with the logos of her beloved baseball team, Twins, on one side. It went missing shortly after I gave it to her. We later pieced together this story: It got left in a common area. The aide held it up and asked if anyone knew whose it was. Yes, someone replied, that is Bill's. So it went to Bill's room. Bill did indeed have a fleece Twins blanket and didn't realize that he now had two. Mom did get her blanket back, but it took a while. Many "thefts" are of the innocent "Oh, here's my read mittens!" variety. People mistake something for their own (even if they haven't had red mittens since 1989).

Label absolutely EVERYTHING. It may not prevent it from walking off, but it will help staff know where it goes when it shows up in the wrong place.

Dementia or even "normal" diminished cognitive functioning is very, very sad. And it makes life difficult for staff and innocent bystanders.

My husband has 2 pair of slippers and a pair of shoes (hard sole) missing. I have talked with the staff twice about this with a promise from them that they would search. So far nothing. There is no way I can find out if this is another resident wandering in or a staff person.

How Low Can They Go!!!

AmyGrace, so sorry to read that your Mom's things are being taken. I wouldn't be surprised if other residents who are wandering might be taking the stuff animals because remember dementia brings on a child like state.

My Mom had only her clothes, and her eyeglasses, nothing else personal. I had brought in Mom's pj's but had noticed the Aides never used the items, instead they had Mom in a hospital gown. So I brought home her pj's. A bathrobe would have been to cumbersome for her to wear.

The facility supplied the toiletries, not the best in the world, but in Mom's dementia state she wouldn't have known the difference anyway :(

Mom had a bulletin board where I had placed her favorite calendar, doubt she even paid attention to it, and I would put up any greeting cards she got which she did smile when I showed her the cards.

Nothing was ever missing in the three months Mom was there, but Mom did gain two clothing items that weren't hers. Mystery how those items found their way into Mom's closet, unless one of Dad's caregiver brought them in for her. I had to put away those clothes because they weren't elder friendly meaning difficult to put on and take off. What I had bought for Mom were tops that had half zippers or half front buttons in front and were one size larger, made it easier for the Aides to dress her.

You could also contact the nursing home ombudsman for your area to complain about the lack of supervision in the center.

Its heartbreaking. Mom is deteriorating, she doesn't talk to any of the residents, she is totally alone and completely dependent on the staff. She is helpless so wouldn't be giving things away, she doesn't even realize when things are missing. This is keeping me up at night. I'm 40 miles away and can't be there all the time. I'm going to bring a marker when I see her Christmas and, as you said Pam, label every single bottle, etc. blakety blank blank This is ridiculous. My mother is slowly dying, and we are paying $11,000 a month for her care only to have her personal effects and clothes stolen!

We had to put the room number on everything. I got the Avery self stick clothing labels and a laundry marking pen. Label all items, bras, shoes, TV remote, even dentures.

Unfortunately you will have to keep anything that is really valuable at home. Even if the staff is taking things, they will never admit it. Make sure that her clothing, and stuffed animals are marked with her name, and follow up with staff if gets missing. They ARE supposed to make sure that she has her clothing. With my aunt, the staff was actually using shampoo that I bought on other patients, besides my aunt. In other words, they decided ' why pick up a shampoo for each resident, when we can just use the same on on all of them?' Same thing with the wine we took her. Within a week it was gone.
Make sure that other residents are not wandering into her room and taking stuff, too. Other than that, not much that you can do. (I think it's crazy, too.)
( Also I would add, that it could be that she has given some of the things to other residents, if she has dementia - my aunt did, sometimes.)