{"id":1712,"date":"2016-08-16T20:00:54","date_gmt":"2016-08-17T03:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/?p=1712"},"modified":"2018-07-02T11:27:49","modified_gmt":"2018-07-02T18:27:49","slug":"this-doctor-broke-the-law-to-engineer-a-better-nursing-home-and-the-death-rate-plummeted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/this-doctor-broke-the-law-to-engineer-a-better-nursing-home-and-the-death-rate-plummeted\/","title":{"rendered":"This Doctor Broke The Law To Engineer a Better Nursing Home, And the Death Rate Plummeted"},"content":{"rendered":"

McKinley Corbley of Good News Network writes:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Even though we are living in an age where growing old is thought of as an inevitable misery, this doctor has been changing the game for seniors over the last 25 years.<\/p>\n

It all started in 1991 when the Harvard-educated physician was transferred from working in a stressful emergency room to being the medical director of a nursing home in upstate New York. The depressing and regimented environment got him thinking on what exactly could improve the residents\u2019 conditions.<\/p>\n

Even though animals in nursing homes were illegal at the time, Dr. Bill Thomas took a chance: based on a hunch, he brought in two dogs, four cats, hens, rabbits, 100 parakeets, a multitude of plants, a flower garden, and vegetable patch.<\/p>\n

The change was dramatic.<\/p>\n

There was a 50% drop in medical prescriptions along with a dramatic decrease in death rates \u2013 but most importantly, the residents were simply happier.<\/p>\n

Dr. Thomas\u2019s approach \u2013 dubbed the Eden Alternative \u2013 has driven nursing homes to allow a more autonomous and creative living space for their elderly. It erases the stereotype that growing old means growing useless, as well as encourages residents to think of their age as an enriching new phase of their life rather than the end of it.<\/p>\n

Thomas, now a speaker and author of several books, also created small, independently run residences with their own bedrooms and bathrooms called Green Houses\u2014and he has been preaching a singular message that getting old is not a bad thing.<\/p>\n

\u201cWithin six weeks, they had to send a truck around to pick up all the wheelchairs,\u201d Thomas told the Washington Post. \u201cYou know why most people [in nursing homes] use wheelchairs? Because the buildings are so damn big.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 56-year-old doctor\u2019s methods have been adopted in Australia, Japan, Canada, and America with mammoth success. Last year he published Second Wind: Navigating the Passage to a Slower, Deeper, and More Connected Life, a guide on how to shift our perspectives on aging and growth.<\/p>\n

He is currently on a trailblazing trip through North America performing with his guitar and his enthusiasm on his Age of Disruption Tour.<\/p>\n

About the Author<\/strong><\/p>\n

Editor and writer for GNN; part-time circus junkie; and part-time English student in community college. Enjoys feminism, bad puns, travel, and copious amounts of stomach-ache inducing pasta.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

McKinley Corbley of Good News Network writes: Even though we are living in an age where growing old is thought of as an inevitable misery, this doctor has been changing the game for seniors over the last 25 years. It all started in 1991 when the Harvard-educated physician was transferred from working in a stressful…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":1713,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sfsi_plus_gutenberg_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_show_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_type":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_alignemt":"","sfsi_plus_gutenburg_max_per_row":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[254,252,253],"class_list":["post-1712","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-elderly","tag-news","tag-nursing-home"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1712","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1712"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1712\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1714,"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1712\/revisions\/1714"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.youwealthrevolution.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}