MONROE — Green County is home to the country’s first dementia stabilization unit.

On Tuesday, Oct. 4, Pleasant View Nursing Home, along with the Monroe Chamber of Commerce and the Wisconsin Department of Health Services, celebrated the ribbon cutting of the new O’Rourke Dementia Stabilization Unit, located at N3150 Wis. 81 outside of Monroe.

“Yesterday was a historic day in serving our community,” said Melissa Even, Monroe Chamber of Commerce executive director. “This is the first of its kind and hopefully will become the template for other communities across the country.”

Dementia, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), is not a specific disease, but rather a general term for the impaired ability to remember, think, or make decisions that interfere with doing everyday activities. Alzheimer’s disease is the most common type of dementia. Neurodegenerative dementias, like Alzheimer’s disease, have no cure, though there are medications that can help protect the brain or manage symptoms like anxiety or behavior changes.

The O’Rourke facility offers short-term respite for the caregivers of dementia patients, while also giving medical assessments and evaluations of the patient. After about a month, the stabilization team meets with the caregiver, educating them on changes, and releases the dementia patient back home.

“Armed with this information, we ‘step into the world’ of the person with dementia and understand what their actions are communicating,” Pleasant View states on its information page. “Part of discharge is to train caregivers at home or in other facilities and provide local resources to build a stronger support team.”

Within 28 days, the stabilization team learns important details about the individual — giving keys to what their behavior means. The resident then receives assessment from multiple experts — including medical, social, psychiatric, psychological and life enrichment resources. Once the resident is stabilized, they can go back home and the caregivers are given all of the information and trained to better perform care.

The program’s mission statement is “to strengthen our communities to care for our own and keep our loved ones close to home.”

Maria B. Johnson, Administrator of Pleasant View Nursing Home, said the need for a facility began 10 years ago in 2012. That’s when the Wisconsin Supreme Court declared that a psychiatric emergency of a dementia patient could not be treated as a mental emergency, which could mean hospitalization.

“Wisconsin is the only state with this law. We had to come up with an entirely unique way to handle it,” Johnson said. “This is unique because the four counties came together to fix the problem on our own. With this facility, we’re going to help of lot of people.”

Johnson and health officials in Green County joined those from Lafayette, Grant and Iowa counties in planning. They realized that just giving caregivers in-home assistance was simply not enough. Sometimes caregivers were running on up to two weeks without sleep, an unhealthy task.

Things picked up in 2016, and by 2019 funding had been secured through a mental health and crisis grant in an amount of $271,000 that went for construction costs to separate the dementia unit from the rest of the nursing home. The man behind the name, Richard O’Rourke, died in January 2019. Johnson has been touring the state telling his story.

O’Rourke was a dementia patient himself, and a resident of Pleasant View. The staff looked around for another facility to send him to for better care, and a son eventually took him to a psychiatric hospital in northern Wisconsin. Unfortunately the change in venue and care did not help, and he died about two weeks later.

At the ribbon cutting ceremony, the O’Rourke family was well represented.

“It was very powerful,” Johnson said of their presence and the speaking of one of Richard’s sons.

The new facility already has a patient registered and under care, and there are six beds in total. Johnson said that if any other counties came aboard, they expect six beds wouldn’t be enough. However, other counties are using the O’Rourke unit as a model. In fact, it could be a model used across the entire country.

Johnson said Pleasant View staff that will work in the unit has received specialized training, and will continue to get up-to-date care and training information moving forward.

“Once again Green County and Monroe have stepped up to address the needs of our community. Through the foresight of many concerned professionals and caregivers we are prepared to address the ongoing needs of residents in multiple counties,” Even said.

Also on hand at the speaking at the ribbon cutting ceremony was Wisconsin DHS Secretary-designee Karen Timberlake. CNA Susan, Pleasant View’s mascot, took part in the ceremonies, as did Monroe Mayor Donna Douglas. 

“Pleasant View Administrator Maria B. Johnson led the ceremony and its impact on patients with dementia, their families and caregivers,” Even said.