Canterbury Woods

I have signed up with Canterbury Woods. Canterbury is a continuing care community, which is what I wanted from the start, and when I went there, it was perfect for me. Everything was available. There is a heated saltwater pool, there's -- it's not exactly a gym, but it had all the equipment, you know, workouts, a beauty shop. The rooms I looked at were quite large, eleven hundred square feet. That was something I was looking for. I had lunch there. It was just phenomenal. It was like going to the best restaurant. I've been in or out of restaurants that weren't as good. They had a cafe there also. That was included in the five hundred dollars of your money that you give every month, it goes to your food so you don't have to bother with paying for it. You just go down and order. A huge facility, it just had everything, and the thing I liked about it was that the independent people looked independent. They were not pulled in, they were walking around, a couple of them were walking their dogs. They had an excellent library. Their library was for intelligent people, they have a cultural center, they're going to be building a 250 seat theater next year. I just felt very comfortable there. The only problem with it, and I'm fortunate enough to have been able to afford it, but it is well out of the reach of most people, but if you could afford it, you're living in luxury.

Independent living is fine until your family member needs help then they don’t get help, unless you pay more. Skilled nursing is understaffed. Food is terrible. Nurses don’t answer call buttons for ages. Patients are left without help beds aren’t changed, patients aren’t bathed. I would give it a zero if possible except the landscape is pretty. Administration doesn’t respond to problems.

When transitioning over from independent living to Assisted or skilled nursing there are no procedures written or helpful instructions. One tries and contacts the administration and they do not answer their phones or then passes you off to other people whom do not know the procedures. When you reach the top, you get uncivil behavior and they refuse to talk to you about basic procedures and the expectations of moving from one place to another. Bottomline, the communication for families assisting their love ones is extremely poor and nothing is transparent. To add the food has recently gone downhill drastically then originally started. This is all too bad as it could be a lovely place, but the top down management is very poor at listeningNd responding to the patrons that live there and their families on all angles and the facility is reflected as such in the delivery of service.

The food at Canterbury Woods Retirement Community is excellent. The level of care they provide increases all the way to nursing care. I went to one of the apartments, and it is nice. Everything about this place gets a high rating from me, though it is a very expensive community. The staff is very friendly.

Canterbury Wood has a tremendous variety of accommodations. Their tour guide was excellent. He showed us an apartment and they bought us lunch right down in the area where they have their staff. They do have life care. They have a lot of facilities and it's near our daughter's home. It's a very professional community, excellent schools and some familiarity for us which we thought was good. They got a lot of alternatives for us but we're not quite ready yet.