If ever you are checking out nursing homes for when you can no longer care for your elders, there are plenty of things which you will need to watch out for. Obviously, visiting them on a day when they are not “gussied up” in expectation of families is the best time to check for anything that may be wrong with the way they care for their existing tenants. After all, how the nursing home treats the people who are already living there is the most likely way that they will end up treating the one you care for, if you decide to place them into that home. There is a major red flag which you will most likely never detect on a visitation day, but which says volumes about the nursing home itself.

This small detail is the ambient smell of the place. In most nursing homes, there are the occasional smells which develop as a result of spilled food or incontinence. However, in a properly staffed facility, these occasions are rare and aberrant, as opposed to being the standard operating procedure of the facility. However, in a home in which there is a smell which can only be compared to an out house, this is your first (and hopefully the last you require) sign that something is not right in this particular state.

When a nursing home has a bad smell about it, this is caused by the place being understaffed. In too many cases, the home is operating under a budget which is designed for profit above proper care. While there might be plenty of well paid administrators willing to dish out the party line when you ask questions, an issue of this nature will most likely never be truly addressed. The staffing situation that exists in there when you first show up at the nursing home is most likely going to be how the home is staffed, even several years later on.