Why I got hurt - big picture
This started out as a reply to 
brigadoondays' comment about how she and my godfather are mad at the agency I work for, for allowing the conditions in which I got hurt. Then it turned into its own post.
The sad part is, this really quickly becomes a big picture problem with The System. Even as I'm frustrated with the way I'm being treated, I can see that the people who run my workplace don't have very many good options. The developmentally disabled population we work with has a level of need for services that is HUGE. The number of salaries that get paid every day to meet those needs is already HUGE. In my classroom, the average consumer (not the one who has 1:1 staff at all times) has:
-- 4 direct care staff in their classroom (1:4 staff to consumer ratio)
-- daily contact with a nurse
-- a speech and language pathologist, daily or weekly
-- a physical and/or occupational therapist team
-- a behaviorist with an advanced degree in psychology
-- a psychiatrist who visits at day program
-- outings about weekly with recreation staff (in addition to other outings with classroom staff and outings from their residence)
-- a day hab Treatment Coordinator
-- a Medicaid Service Coordinator
-- a Human Rights Committee to review their care
-- another state-appointed special reviewer if they were ever institutionalized at Willowbrook before it was closed
-- a residence that's more highly staffed than day program
-- transportation on specialized buses with 2 direct care staff on board
-- a full complement of doctors for their various medical needs
-- you get the picture. And they really do seem to need it all.
For a person like me to be at less risk in the ordinary line of duty, the first thing you'd need would be higher direct care staff ratios. Not just so there are more people available to restrain people, but also so you could engage more folks in more interesting programming so there would be fewer challenging behaviors. That wouldn't eliminate staff injuries, but it would reduce them significantly. But to do that, you have to convince a lot of people that you need even more staff than that whole list above -- not only program directors, but the state government and the voters who have to pay for it.
The big institutions were not better. Staff were not safer and the only conditions the state was willing/able to pay for were grossly abusive and neglectful to the consumers on a daily basis. It was only under the immanent threat of tremendous lawsuits and even higher cost in financial awards to families that the state closed the institutions. And it's no easy thing to just say government shouldn't be in this business at all -- these folks would not be OK at home with families, even those who have them. They have more needs than any family can handle. A few would be OK, just at the expense of any life their caregivers might have otherwise had. More would be badly abused and neglected by exhausted and beaten-up caregivers. Others would be abandoned or run away, and then end up either dead or in prison very quickly, just by trying to survive using the very limited skills available to them.
I'm saying this about specific people that I know and love. Unless you know someone who has a serious developmental disability, it's hard to communicate how someone can be so impaired, have so many needs, and yet how very very human they are and how much human relationship they are capable of. Regardless of how any of this turns out, it has been an amazing experience to get to know them.
Without massive, expensive government intervention, these guys are screwed. With what they have now, they are sort of OK, and their staff get hurt a lot. If we could spend more money, they and their staff could be a lot safer. Can we, the taxpayers of this fair state, afford it? And what does it mean if we can't?
brigadoondays' comment about how she and my godfather are mad at the agency I work for, for allowing the conditions in which I got hurt. Then it turned into its own post.
The sad part is, this really quickly becomes a big picture problem with The System. Even as I'm frustrated with the way I'm being treated, I can see that the people who run my workplace don't have very many good options. The developmentally disabled population we work with has a level of need for services that is HUGE. The number of salaries that get paid every day to meet those needs is already HUGE. In my classroom, the average consumer (not the one who has 1:1 staff at all times) has:
-- 4 direct care staff in their classroom (1:4 staff to consumer ratio)
-- daily contact with a nurse
-- a speech and language pathologist, daily or weekly
-- a physical and/or occupational therapist team
-- a behaviorist with an advanced degree in psychology
-- a psychiatrist who visits at day program
-- outings about weekly with recreation staff (in addition to other outings with classroom staff and outings from their residence)
-- a day hab Treatment Coordinator
-- a Medicaid Service Coordinator
-- a Human Rights Committee to review their care
-- another state-appointed special reviewer if they were ever institutionalized at Willowbrook before it was closed
-- a residence that's more highly staffed than day program
-- transportation on specialized buses with 2 direct care staff on board
-- a full complement of doctors for their various medical needs
-- you get the picture. And they really do seem to need it all.
For a person like me to be at less risk in the ordinary line of duty, the first thing you'd need would be higher direct care staff ratios. Not just so there are more people available to restrain people, but also so you could engage more folks in more interesting programming so there would be fewer challenging behaviors. That wouldn't eliminate staff injuries, but it would reduce them significantly. But to do that, you have to convince a lot of people that you need even more staff than that whole list above -- not only program directors, but the state government and the voters who have to pay for it.
The big institutions were not better. Staff were not safer and the only conditions the state was willing/able to pay for were grossly abusive and neglectful to the consumers on a daily basis. It was only under the immanent threat of tremendous lawsuits and even higher cost in financial awards to families that the state closed the institutions. And it's no easy thing to just say government shouldn't be in this business at all -- these folks would not be OK at home with families, even those who have them. They have more needs than any family can handle. A few would be OK, just at the expense of any life their caregivers might have otherwise had. More would be badly abused and neglected by exhausted and beaten-up caregivers. Others would be abandoned or run away, and then end up either dead or in prison very quickly, just by trying to survive using the very limited skills available to them.
I'm saying this about specific people that I know and love. Unless you know someone who has a serious developmental disability, it's hard to communicate how someone can be so impaired, have so many needs, and yet how very very human they are and how much human relationship they are capable of. Regardless of how any of this turns out, it has been an amazing experience to get to know them.
Without massive, expensive government intervention, these guys are screwed. With what they have now, they are sort of OK, and their staff get hurt a lot. If we could spend more money, they and their staff could be a lot safer. Can we, the taxpayers of this fair state, afford it? And what does it mean if we can't?