3,287 Comments for Danvers State Hospital

You'd have to find out some legal things first. Does her family have a durable Power of Attorney over your GA. In that case they can put her in. To keep her in they'd have to have her found incompetent. If a relative did the exam and benefited from it sounds limke a major conflict of interest to me. Maybe actionable, especially since he's derived benefit from it.. The "home" sounds pretty draconian to me, The legal stuff is public record and shouldn't be had to find out about. Having POA means that they have to act in your GA's behalf and her best interests all the time. They are permitted to be reimbursed for expenses. You may have tpo file suit to have things changed it' would be problematic because she his only an aunt

Hi Lynne,
Please don't be cross with me but I want to ask you a question which is going to sound VERY strange but I am dead serious.

Is it possible for an older person to be admitted into a nursing home when they really don't need to be?

I ask because I just found out that a Great Aunt of mine was put into a home in New England. Now this is odd because she was always very active and I know she didn't want to go into a home. She was moved practically overnight into the home six months ago but we just found out about it last week.

In this place she is not allowed to leave, she is not allowed to go into town, she is not allowed to make phone calls or have a phone in her room. She must be in bed by 6:30 and make NO NOISE, no radio or TV. Visitors are only allowed in for 45 minutes three days a week. I'm not kidding.

This woman is not sick nor is she declining mentally. We got her on the phone and she remembered who we were right away--she started crying talking to use on the phone. She kept thanking us for "finding her."

Now all of this seemed really weird to us and we weren't getting any answers from distance family so we decided to take a long shot and called my Aunt's best friend who still lives in town. So here's the crazy stuff:

Word on the street is that my Aunt is not crazy at all but was diagnosed as being "demented" and moved into the dementia ward of the local nursing home.

This is a rich old woman and when she was moved into the home all her nieces and nephews (she has no children and all her nieces and nephews are now in their 40s and 50s) got control over her money. So far we KNOW that one of her nephews has brought a boat, another has a shiny new corvette and one of the nieces is away on a surprise European holiday. They came into all this money as my Aunt was put away.

We know that a doctor must confirm that my Aunt was senile and so we asked who did the examination. It turns out her nieces husband did the examination thus when the old woman was locked away he also got a share of her money!

Lynne, is this possible? Can a relative actually do an examination of an older person and deem them "demented"? They live in a small town mind you so he might have been one of the only doctors around. He is also tightly knit with the other few doctors in his firm.

I'm just asking if this is possible? I mean could they really get away with something like this? They have almost drained her $700,000 bank account in a few months!

How can a relative do an examine? Can they?

I know this sounds like the classic "tormented patient" saga but now this seems to really be happening in my family. In this day and age? How?

I figured I'd ask you about the doctor thing hoping you'd know. Thanks. I'm just worried about her.

You should see all the posts I deleted before I actually sent these few in. ;-)

My lynne we are on a roll aren't we :)

Why would we ever lock up insane people? They are way too much work and difficult to handle, to boot. We only want the ones who are sane because they are still able to do what we ask. Oh, you silly people, thinking residential psychiatric facilities are for people with psychiatric issues. They are just too durned much work - don't you get it?

No view he found inside his prison. Every window was the same, and now he waits, his final sentance. Fore he was never insane.

Imagine the screams that echoed from that room. In fear that her voices would kill her. Fearing the "shocks". Destroying everything in her life in one fatal swoop, her world had ended.

"HOLY CRAP! Please be careful where you walk people! My heart is rolling around somewhere on the floor here, because it just jumped out of my chest!"

These wards remind me of Prison Cells

Can,t you Imagine living in a place like
this your whole life I can,t

Looks like a nightmare !!!!!

YOU WANT THE STORY ??? former patient been there from 10 to 16 until he was adopted by a rich family ... he returned to the place when he was 25, he wanted to show to people what happened there. Some menbers of the administration aliciated children with candys in return of sexual favors. One of the former members of the administration was also found dead tied up to a chair in his house where he was forced to eat twinkies till he died , on the table in from of him was written " sweet death " with the same handwritting that is presently seen on the stairs to his now abandoned office ... DAMN !!! must stop seing all these movies

does that look like someone looking through the bars of that window let me know if ne1 else can see it

TRULY AWESOME PICS!! WHAT A SHAME THAT THIS PLACE COULDN'T BE SAVED. WHAT HAPPEN TO PRESERVING HISTORY. MY COUSIN WAS IN THE BONNER BUILDING, NEVER GOT A CHANCE TO PEAK INSIDE THE MAIN GOTHIC BUILDING.

beautiful, i love the leaves on the ground and how they match the building.