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Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

oregonlive.com

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Re: Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

#91

Post by pishpash »

gruez wrote: post #78
mtnGoat wrote: post #67

Playing devils advocate here but maybe we have too many fire fighters? I have four good friends that work in metropolitan fire houses all making well into the six figures. They constantly joke about how they get paid to do nothing and haven’t been on a fire in years, mainly they respond to calls at old folks homes. Oh and the only work a four or five days a month.

> Playing devils advocate here but maybe we have too many fire fighters? It sounds like the type of service that you want to over-provision for. What if a major fire broke out and you needed all of them?

Have a reserve, like the military?

Re: Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

#92

Post by vbezhenar »

Factorium wrote: post #45
john_yaya wrote: post #15

Senior homes and assisted living centers are a national disgrace. They are entirely about profit maximization (what business isn’t?), and as such hire people at the exact minimum and have well over 100% yearly turnover. The staff commonly steal from residents, and the management do not care. They’d rather retain a larcenous pig who barely executes her duties than have to go back and scrape the barrel for a replacemen…

The necessary innovation is ethical/political. People over age 80 should be able to request to medically cease their life for any reason.

You can buy gun. Why do you have to request anything?

Re: Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

#93

Post by dataflow »

ErikVandeWater wrote: post #72
soperj wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The US can barely afford to school its children You're the richest nation on earth. You can afford it, the people who control the purse strings choose to use it on other shit that benefits themselves.

Humor me, by what measure is the US the richest nation on earth, or even close? Anything per capita will be dominated by Monaco/other tax havens. Anything on a gross level will be dominated by China.

Well if you have to pick something, the US has the highest GDP in the world.

Re: Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

#94

Post by mod »

commoner wrote: post #49
dls2016 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know there are a lot of places in the US with volunteer fire departments, right?

> NFPA estimates there were an estimated 1,115,000 career and volunteer firefighters in the United States in 2018. Of the total number of firefighters 370,000 (33%) were career firefighters and 745,000 (67%) were volunteer firefighters. https://www.nfpa.org/News-and-Research/Data-research-and-too...

Where I live (quite rural) the entire department is composed of volunteers. The "fire chief" even is a volunteer.

We like to say they'll get there just in time to save the foundation.

Re: Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

#95

Post by rrrrrrrrrrrryan »

john_yaya wrote: post #15

Senior homes and assisted living centers are a national disgrace. They are entirely about profit maximization (what business isn’t?), and as such hire people at the exact minimum and have well over 100% yearly turnover. The staff commonly steal from residents, and the management do not care. They’d rather retain a larcenous pig who barely executes her duties than have to go back and scrape the barrel for a replacemen…

> And it’s time to stop spending $500K on medical care just so an 88 year old can make it to 89.

Does U.S. Medicare not use QALYs? (Quality Adjusted Life-Years)

The WHO recommends using 3x GDP/capita for each QALY, which would set America's threshold somewhere around $150k, not the $500k in your example.

Re: Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

#96

Post by [deleted] »

dragonwriter wrote: post #53
tomrod wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the solution is to spend less money but pay people more, and shoulder the rest on taxpayers? This probably won't work very long since the population isn't as triangular as it used to be (to my understanding this is what happened to Japan). I get the justified call to fix things for people that require these services. The US can barely afford to school its children, purchase its homes, or enact reasonable public he…

> The US can barely afford to school its children, purchase its homes, or enact reasonable public health measures without bankrupting people. No, it can easily afford all that. It chooses not to because the US (that is, the majority of political power in the country) prefers to impose the pain of the imminent risk and frequent reality of bankruptcy on the working class.

[deleted]

Re: Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

#97

Post by Aloha »

john_yaya wrote: post #15

Senior homes and assisted living centers are a national disgrace. They are entirely about profit maximization (what business isn’t?), and as such hire people at the exact minimum and have well over 100% yearly turnover. The staff commonly steal from residents, and the management do not care. They’d rather retain a larcenous pig who barely executes her duties than have to go back and scrape the barrel for a replacemen…

You can take care of my mother then, I didn't sign up for that burden.

Re: Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

#98

Post by [deleted] »

elil17 wrote: post #32
MattGaiser wrote: post #3

If there is an industry that needs startups, it is long term care and senior care in general. Expensive, nearly universally badly done, and it seems like a lot of people could stay in their homes with some automated appliances/thoughtful redesigns of everyday items. Hoping that when my grandparents start needing it in 5-10 years that the options have dramatically improved.

Sounds like an industry that needs regulation and public sector intervention. If you care and have a lot of money, you can pay for home health aids who will do an excellent job caring for your elderly relatives. The issues is that a good number of people just don't care and take an "out of sight out of mind" approach. A startup can't disrupt this, only regulations which protect elder rights can. Those who do care fre…

[deleted]

Re: Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

#99

Post by burkaman »

ErikVandeWater wrote: post #72
soperj wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The US can barely afford to school its children You're the richest nation on earth. You can afford it, the people who control the purse strings choose to use it on other shit that benefits themselves.

Humor me, by what measure is the US the richest nation on earth, or even close? Anything per capita will be dominated by Monaco/other tax havens. Anything on a gross level will be dominated by China.

By net wealth (assets - liabilities). Here's a Wikipedia list (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_wea...) based on the Credit Suisse Global Wealth Report (https://www.credit-suisse.com/about-us/en/reports-research/g...). You're right that it's not even close, the US is almost twice as rich as China in the #2 spot.

Re: Firefighters say they’re swamped by calls for routine care from senior homes

#100

Post by paulryanrogers »

gowld wrote: post #58
titanomachy wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> US is unwilling to support euthanasia I don’t know about the rest of the US, but Washington and Oregon have allowed physician-assisted suicide for the terminally ill for years.

Parent was referring to physician-mandated homicide.

Were they?

If I wanted a chip to help me commit suicide once I'm no longer mentally fit then is that legal?

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