I highly recommend Stonebridge Assisted Living and Memory Care. After my elderly mother’s sudden illness and diagnosis of dementia, she required multiple hospitalizations. Suffering a rapid decline, I was finally told by hospital doctors that she would not recover her ability to walk or care for herself in any meaningful way. She was refusing food due to swallowing issues and would only sometimes take water. The hospital’s recommendation was to move her to hospice and allow her to decline and pass. Devastating news. Fortunately, I had already secured a placement for my mom at Stonebridge, and after consulting with their multidisciplinary staff, they encouraged me to transfer Mom back to their care, so she could be further evaluated. What happened next was nothing short of a miracle. My mother, who at that point was unable to safely swallow, speak, or move her body, had given up her will to live. But Stonebridge did not give up on her. In concert, the facility’s director, their skilled nurses, med techs, PAs, PTs, Speech pathologists — the entire community — rallied around my mother in an attempt to offer her another chance at life. A thorough re-evaluation of her medications was performed. The nutritionist determined a diet that she could take onboard as she healed. My mom is also very spiritual, and I was overwhelmed by the number of staff members who came just to sit and pray with her when she was unable to speak. Staff even came to visit her on their days off! Gradually the interventions began to work! Over the course of a couple of months, and as a result of this dedicated and compassionate care, my mother has been able to recover her ability to walk, talk, eat solid foods, and is now able to attend onsite church services, social activities and enjoys visits with family. She has picked up weight and regularly engages in physical therapy, which has greatly improved her mobility and reduced her physical pain. I’m so thankful I didn’t listen to the doctors at the hospital — and took Stonebridge’s advice to bring her back to them. At the risk of leaving someone out, special recognition is owed to Betty, Brenda, Sara, Moira, Renee, Rebecca, Barbara, Karen, Flo, DJ, and Fabiola. At a time when healthcare and senior services are stretched so thin, and our social services are overwhelmed, it’s refreshing to see a care team that truly values their residents as their own family, by treating the entire person — physically, mentally, socially and spiritually. Thank you Stonebridge!
Originally my father was released from the ICU Naval Hospital aboard Camp LeJeune to Carolina Rivers Rehabilitation in Jacksonville. Within 15 days they had managed to almost kill him!! After demanding they call an ambulance an bring him back to the Naval Hospital, he spent close to a week recovering from the abuse of Carolina Rivers.
Dad’s pastor a Naval Cmdr recommended Woodbury Wellness Center in Hampstead. While we were discussing this the doctor in charge of my father’s care told me she had great confidence in this facility.. That was all I needed to know.
My father originally suffered his health issues 29 April and had suffered a heart attack, stroke, and other severe conditions, leaving him unable to walk; (all taking place at Carolina Rivers), he was walking when brought to Carolina Rivers. The first thing you notice when you walk into Woodbury Wellness Center is “Wow”!!! Then there’s no smell of urine and you know the smell! It’s located on the Waterway, and absolutely gorgeous. The staff, no matter what position is amazing!!!
1.Carolina Rivers wouldn’t give us a list of the medications they were giving my father. At Woodbury this was printed out and given to me.
2. Food: Woodbury you can choose from a menu the meals you’re going to eat for the week. The meals are served warm, and reheated if not warm enough. At the Rivers dad’s try would sit in the hall for hours before being brought to his room cold
3. I have pictures of the time patients waiting at the Rivers of 50 minutes and more. Dad would have to call us to call them to tell them he needed changed he had been waiting for over an hour. At Woodbury the nurses are right there, and 10 to 15 minutes to get changed. But they answer the call.
4. A doctor and PA really does check on your family. Dad arrived on a Friday afternoon, and yet the doctor at the facility didn’t like the look of dad’s knee. Ordered X-rays, and found dad had a torn meniscus, from the Rivers.
We were told over a month ago to prepare for dad to pass. Since being at Woodbury dad is walking, and feeding himself, today he called to say he’s being released. If you love someone, and they need time to recover, Woodbury Wellness Center is the only place I will ever trust. Walk into these places unannounced, you will see the difference!
I would not recommend sending anyone you care about to Woodbury. My father was blind with early dementia, and heart and liver failure when he went to live there. He struggled with moving to a nursing home as an independent and cantankerous man, and the dementia made him worse specifically at night. I understand my father gave the staff a hard time as he was often combative and mean. But that should not have had any bearing on his care, and I believe it did. I also believe that post-Covid and with terrible management and high turnover some of the staff at Woodbury were incompetent when it came to his care.
Throughout my father's tenure at Woodbury, there were issues with staff doing Hospice-only procedures, hospice finding my father in pee-soaked beds or diapers, my father's call button being ignored for long periods, and many more. I saw staff bringing my BLIND father trays of food, leaving them across the room with no conversation with him about how his meal had arrived and where it was leaving him unable to even reach his food, or know what it was.
When we moved him in we set up his room with pictures on the wall, things from his apartment, and organized his clothes and belongings. A week went by and my father had to be sent back to the ER and all of his belongings were packed up; since he is on Medicaid his room could not be held for him. When he returned many of his belongings went missing, including his hand-carved walking cane, a lamp, art we hung on the wall, a new pair of headphones, some cash, and other heirlooms that were left to help him adjust. When I called several employees from nurses to the heads of administration and environmental services to help me try to find these items, I was met with no empathy whatsoever and even a hint of contempt. These items were never returned.
A few weeks later, when I called my father he sounded horrible. He said that he had a fever and his body hurt all over and he felt extremely sick. I called to speak with his nurse, who was the former hall manager, and expressed concern that my father might have COVID. The nurse told me that my dad was “just being your dad” and that he had not had any of his gabapentin in two days because they “ran out and the nurses on shift were too lazy to go and refill it”. At this point, I explained that it was unbelievable that they had not tested my dad for COVID, and were shrugging off a man who was very sick. The nurse said that they could not test my dad because the tests were locked up and no one had access that was currently on shift. After screaming my way through 3 nurses I finally got them to test my dad for covid and he tested positive.
My father passed recently and in his final days, I witnessed some nurses who were incredible, caring, and helpful to both me and him. I also witnessed nurses and CNAs who barely checked on my father, left him in soiled diapers, and attempted to give him pills like he could swallow them even though he was catatonic and on morphine for comfort. After hospice adjusted his medication, I had to tell a nurse twice to check the medication order because she still was trying to give him all of his pills.
All the while the hall manager, whom I had spoken with on the phone for months about my father's care, came in and out of my father's rooms, passed me in the halls, and didn’t as much as introduce herself or give any condolences to me or my family.
After my father’s passing, Woodbury attempted to charge my father’s bank account for his Medicaid PML for the next month. Not only were they explicitly told not to charge us without consent to make sure the SSI payment would be in the account, but they were also attempting to charge for a month after my father's death. When I called to tell them how unbelievable it was that they would charge us, especially for a dead man, they swore that the charge was not attempted - even though I have proof from the bank that it was.
If you can avoid Woodbury, I would. It’s a nice looking facility on the surface, but for us, it was a terrible place to live and work with.
I’m sure smart people who read these reviews clearly see there “ has to another side”. Woodbury is well lived by its residents and families. The staff that “shows up to work, doesn’t quit without notice, doesn’t all off - and I mean ALOT (16x in 3 months or similar) Enjoy the patient ratio, teamwork and caring environment !! Thank you to all that can see the real truths!! Unfortunately, some cannot accept their own accountability.
Most reviews are written with negative comments about the particular establishment because normally people will only write a review if the experience was bad and may not take the time to write a review if it was a good experience. While those reviews are appreciated, I wanted to take the time to write a positive review about Woodbury. My mother was in rehab at Woodbury for 1 1/2 months after a fall in late April that put her in the hospital with a broken hip. Once my mom got settled into Woodbury, visits were only allowed outside the facility due to Covid. Theresa or Ryan would usually bring my mom out to me for our visits and they always made sure that she was comfortable and stayed close by to take her back to her room. Just listening to their conversations with her while taking her back inside let me know that they genuinely cared about her and how her visit went with me. Her main nurses Melissa and Sara were wonderful and kept me updated on her condition when needed. I called them quite a few times with questions about my mom and they were always so very helpful and would often check on her while we were on the phone and come back and let me she was fine or had gotten her what she needed. She has some dementia and would often get confused as to where she was and would call me and I in turn would call Sara or Melissa and they would go and take care of her needs and I could just tell that they did not mind at all. That peace of mind is priceless when you are not allowed inside to help care for your loved ones. She had other nurses as well and they all were wonderful. Her physical therapy was led by Elizabeth and honestly had it not been for her team and their patience with my mom (she can be very feisty) she could not have come home but would have had to go to a nursing home. Instead they encouraged her and made her believe that she could do the exercises needed to get her home. Her CNA's probably knew her best and she definitely tried them sometimes but never once did I ever feel like she was mistreated or that her requests were ignored. My mom will say over and over that Woodbury was so good to her and that they always took care of her. I know this review is lengthy but hopefully it will give you the confidence needed to check out Woodbury for your loved ones short term rehab.
