Family member is not being changed overnight. Only once before shift change. What ideas can you give me on how to handle this. I already addressed the issue with the facility but because they can't get anyone to work the night shift, they belive they can get away with it.
There are other ways to solve the nursing home staffing problem that doesn't include importing unskilled immigrants that will put more strain and cost on our social services. Make universal healthcare like every other country in the world. That's one way. Another way is to make nursing homes and other LTC facilities non-profits. The "business" aspect of human services has to be removed from the equasion. Remove the potential for profit and watch the cost of healthcare and staffing problems associated to it drop fast.
For profit nursing homes are trying to maximize profits so they short staff and pay workers barely min. wages.
Don't give up addressing this situation. Your family member is at risk for skin breakdown if they are in their wet/soiled brief too long. It is okay to get the obudsman involved.
If they have already acknowledged that they can not get anyone to work the over night shift, then your family member needs to be moved to a different facility.
They are not getting full round-the-clock care.
As far as changing diapers, yes, ideally it should be done every few hours, including overnight. I take care of my husband at home, and I do not change him overnight. I change his diaper before I go to bed, and change him when he wakes up in the morning. He's not suffering any skin breakdown, and this routine works for us.
That alone is not sufficient reason to fault your care home, but if your loved one needs 24 hour care, it is a problem if they have no one working overnight!
There is a labor shortage ongoing (due to the increase in elders and a significantly smaller younger population). If there aren't any actual people to do the work, I'm not sure what the solution would be except to purchase and stock better, more absorbent disposables for this family member.
The shortage in labor is because LTC facilities don't want to pay their CNA staff a wage that isn't an insult for the work they do and they won't hire the number of CNA's a facility needs to make sure the residents get the care they need. It cuts into their profit to hire. It is not uncommon to have one CNA caregiver assigned to a dozen or more patients. Go on the third shift and you'll be lucky to see two CNA's on duty.
There are plenty of unemployed people who would do this work. If it offered and paid fairly the wages and benefits it deserves. It's for this reason that I refused to work in a nursing home and this was over 30 years ago. My reasoning was why should I change diapers, toilet, feed, do hygiene care, and transfers for a whole floor of patients to make the same money with no benefits that I could make working for one person at a time as a homecare CNA. Then I went private-duty and that really paid.
There's a time honored saying. 'You get what you pay for'. Nursing homes offer their essential CNA staff low-pay with no benefits. They can't expect people will go into CNA work in nursing homes. It's not worth their labor.