Rethinking the assisted-living model

Earlier this year, Steve Gurney was filling out an application for a small apartment. One of the things his new landlord wanted to know was which funeral home to contact if he died.

Gurney wasn't moving into an ordinary apartment -- he was going to an assisted-living facility, where the units usually are occupied by older people who aren't terribly sick but nonetheless need help with day-to-day activities.

Gurney isn't elderly -- he's 43, married and has two children. He's in good health.

Nonetheless, he was checking into an assisted-living community -- though for only a week -- to catch a glimpse of the experience that has become such a routine part of life for older people in America. He did it because he had realized there was a huge gap in his knowledge, even though he had made a career of advising families on housing and care arrangements for older Americans.

"I was taking my kids to their first day of school a year ago," Gurney said. "They started asking me about my own first day of school, and I was speaking with authority. I dropped them off and drove to my job," he said.

But the conversation with the kids was a reminder of an inconsistency in his life, he thought.

Gurney is founder and publisher of the "Guide to Retirement Living SourceBook," which compiles extensive data on senior-living communities in several East Coast regions. 

"It occurred to me I was helping all these people make decisions about moving into senior housing, and it seemed odd that I hadn't experienced it myself," he said. So he decided to walk the walk -- at least as far as he could.

In February, he moved for a week into a Maryland assisted-living residence, with no cell phone, no job contact and no family contact. He followed that in August with a week at a Washington continuing-care retirement community, which offers independent living, assisted-living and skilled-nursing services within one campus.

The second time, he brought along his 6-year-old son, Asa.

He hasn't been the same since, he says.

Galvanized by his interactions with older people and the insights of Asa, Gurney talks excitedly about changing the industry upon which he has built a career. He wants to figure out ways to change the image and to reduce age segregation.

He wants the industry to create communities where older people still get the services and care they need while living among younger people -- even among whole families. He'd love to see college students living alongside people who inch along with the aid of walkers.

"One of my goals is to get people to stop thinking that these places are the last places that older people live and to get people to think that this is a place where just people live," said Gurney.

He knows that much of this is blue-skies stuff -- that unless some incredible sea change occurs, the cultural segregation will continue, and older adults will continue to fear, often unnecessarily, such institutionalized living arrangements, he said. ...CONTINUED

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