3 Comments Posted by Franco

BSMarcia. I certainly would not deny that there are lousy group home agencies. The first agency I worked for in 1983 eventually lost their contracts for the group homes (only after many employees left the agency and made their comments to MH/MR). In the year I was there (I switched to the agency that was running their day program) I remember countless Dr. appointments in which the Dr stated "this should have been taken care of years ago". Every one of the people I worked with had their meds drastically reduced by the end of the first year. That is really scary after what you said about their meds being drastically reduced before leaving Pennhurst. I know that the main reason the meds were reduced was because the head resident advisor (or whatever we were called in those days) was a great advocate for the people and pushed the Drs. when they didn't want to do a thorough job. I know that not every group home had a leader like her. I am not going to say that everyone who left Pennhurst had as many problems as the people I worked with but I know the people I worked with. I am not really damning Pennhurst/Pennhurst staff as I am damning the MR system as a whole. It is just as screwed up today as it was when Pennhurst was closed. Please don't take it personally as I have been part of the same system for the past 22 years.

Let me preface this entire statement by saying my first job "in the field" was back in 1983 in a group home set up for people returning to York Co from Pennhurst. I was outraged at the physical condition of the people I worked with. Most of the time spent was running Dr. appointments for what should have been taken care of years before. Most of the people were on some heavy duty medications that left them "manageable". I was also outraged that families didn't give a rat's a** about their own family members. Over the year's my opinion about Pennhurst and the families has changed. I've read a lot about Pennhurst, including Superintendent's reports. I've come to the conclusion that Pennhurst (as well as most human service state run agencies) was doomed from the start. It was supposed to be the grand experiment where people would learn to become self-sufficient. It actually opened before it was supposed to and most of the buildings were not even completed or built properly. Each superintendent's report had huge lists of what was needed to make things run properly and how much it would cost. The money never came from the state and Pennhurst went downhill each year. As the money got tight, the quality of the staff went downhill because of lack of proper training, inability to consistently attract the highest quality staff due to wages and increasing burnout due to longer hours and lack of support. I'm not saying that there were not good staff there. It's just that even the best of people make mistakes when they are tired or put into situations where there is no back-up or support. Add this to the fact that the mr field historically has not been the best at research in designing programs that work. I even got to the point that I understood the stressors placed on parents who placed their sons and daughters in instutions. The education system didn't have anything positive for the kids in those days. The medical profession put a ton of pressure on the parents that this was the best thing for the child and that anything else would be cruel and inhuman. The church even got into the act by saying that these kids were God's holy innocents and that they needed to be protected from the real world. I saw how much guilt the parent's had over allowing their kids to be placed there. Well folks the same thing is happening in the group home and "sheltered workshop" system now. The state in their infinate wisdom has fairly well frozen the funding (or has graciously alllowed a 2-3% increase in funding) to run programming all the while adding new unfunded mandates to suck the lifeblood from the organization. Turnover for all agencies is at the highest level it has ever seen. I believe I read somewhere the average employee left after 6 months. Yes, there were abuses at Pennhurst and yes, abuse is still going on in the mr field. People need to learn the lessons of Pennhurst and the lessons of the present system and grow. Sorry for the long rant.

You ran these cards through a machine called a language master. They are still in use