The New Nursing Home (Proto Magazine Fall 2013 Edition)

By Proto Staff | PRONTO MAGAZINE, Fall 2013
Jill Herold’s widowed 92-year-old mother, Evelyn Mehlhop, had a broken hip and dementia, and clearly needed around-the-clock care. Yet Herold hated the idea of moving her into a nursing home, particularly after she toured facilities that lived up to her worst expectations—drab, highly regimented mini-hospitals with dim corridors and unhappy residents. Then she walked into theLeonard Florence Center for Living in Chelsea, Mass., where her first surprise was the aroma of baking cookies, not antiseptics.The lobby, known as Main Street, houses a bakery-café, a deli and a spa-salon, and there’s an outdoor garden for residents, among other amenities. “It was like an elegant hotel, about as far from anything medical as you could imagine,” Herold says.
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