Lakeside Special Care Center sits on lovely, park-like grounds in Lakeside, California, where three fenced cottages give residents room to move safely and enjoy the outdoors, and folks can often see staff and visitors out walking or heading to the clubhouse for light recreation. The center has 94 licensed beds and offers services for adults 18 years or older, focusing on people who need both long-term skilled nursing care and support for severe psychiatric needs. Certified Nursing Assistants, Licensed Vocational Nurses, and Registered Nurses provide care around the clock for those who need help with things like bathing, dressing, medication management, and eating, and the place has an adult residential facility and specialized memory care for people with Alzheimer's or other kinds of dementia, with safety features to prevent wandering and reduce confusion.
People can choose studio rooms, and folks who need ongoing care can rely on a team of staff, including therapists who work together with nursing staff, to cover rehabilitation, psychiatric, and total patient care. The center handles substance recovery, offers special treatment programs including one with 58 beds to help residents either get better or slow decline, and holds recovery meetings, pet therapy, and educational programs to keep days interesting. Residents have access to mental health rehab, behavioral health programs, behavioral bed options, and care for those with severe psychiatric impairment. The facility uses a recovery, wellness, and discovery approach, so there are behavioral modification meetings and psychotropic drug reviews, plus staff hold behavioral team meetings to discuss care.
Daily life includes nutritious chef-prepared meals made with good ingredients and menu choices to please most diets, with special supplements when needed. The staff also run social, physical, mental, and emotional activities, and these have brought in awards for engagement. There are religious services, group and individual therapy, daily activities, outings in the community, and adult education programs. Physical and occupational therapy is offered, though the average physical therapy time is about 3 minutes per resident each day. Residents have social worker support, pharmacy, dental, laboratory, podiatry, beautician, X-ray, and housekeeping services. The grounds are undergoing renovations and a new building is going up to expand their program. For people who want to visit, there's an option to schedule a tour, look at a map, or fill out a form for more information.
The center has a five-star rating from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services for quality, staffing, and health inspections, and it participates in Medicare's quality reporting system. The average overall rating is about 6 out of 10. Community feedback says staff are helpful, joyful, and kind, creating a friendly culture for residents. Lakeside Special Care Center accepts both Medicare and Medicaid and offers work opportunities for CNAs, sometimes with a sign-on bonus. The facility serves seniors who want independent living with less hassle but are also set up for people who need more help, and the focus remains on health, safety, enrichment, and making things easier for residents as they age or heal.
