Susie Singer Carter, No Country For Old People

Today Alison interviews Film Director Susie Singer Carter, Talking about her film No Country For Old People

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I have from.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Okay, welcome to the Alison Aringham Show. I know Alison Ingram.

Speaker 3 (00:21):
Okay, some of you may recognize me.

Speaker 2 (00:23):
As evil Nellie Olsen, but luckily tonight Alison Aringram and
this is the Alison Ingram Show. And here in the
Allison Ingraham Show, we talk about things that make you
feel good, the movies and the TV shows that made
us feel good and the people who made them, and
people who are doing things now to make the world
a better and more interesting place.

Speaker 3 (00:45):
Now I always say that make you feel good. I
don't know if this episode is going to make you feel.

Speaker 2 (00:50):
Good, but we definitely have someone who's trying to make
the world a better place and doing good job of it.

Speaker 3 (00:56):
Horrifying information. It will be any of you.

Speaker 2 (01:01):
We're all at that age, around my age. All of
us have a relative in some kind of care or
about to be in some kind of care.

Speaker 3 (01:10):
We all know this.

Speaker 2 (01:11):
Everyone is in a retirement home or a halfway hospice,
a thing.

Speaker 3 (01:16):
Some of your care. What happens to those homes?

Speaker 2 (01:18):
And we hear stories about people and I have friends
like even stayed part briefly for a post operative in
like an elder care home or like, what the hell
is this place? And you hear these stories, horror stories
coming out of there, and what we always hear is
they're underfunded. And how would you feel if you found
that they actually are pocketing vast sums of money?

Speaker 3 (01:41):
Well not.

Speaker 2 (01:42):
Yeah, So we have someone who's getting to the bottom
of this as a documentary, is doing amazing things to
try to help people in this situation, the amazing producer
director Asusi Singer Carter.

Speaker 1 (01:54):
Hello, Pa, you play for them?

Speaker 3 (02:00):
How are you and doing?

Speaker 1 (02:02):
Wow? I'm so happy to be at this juncture after
we've been working on this dock for three years and
just intense, and when my mom passed away in twenty
twenty two, we just decided I have to do a
documentary about this because when I found out actually what
had what was really propagating all the all of my

(02:24):
stress for the past prior six months, I realized I
had seen and I knew too much that if I
didn't share it, I would be culpable.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
Right, you had you had to, I mean, and and
you're your producer anyway, you this is what you do.

Speaker 3 (02:41):
You've done other stuff right right?

Speaker 1 (02:45):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (02:46):
Right?

Speaker 1 (02:46):
Writer, producer, director, everything, especially your arm.

Speaker 2 (02:51):
Form to begin with, and here your mom who's actually
being mistreated in one of these homes.

Speaker 3 (02:57):
It's like yeah, so hello.

Speaker 1 (02:59):
Yeah, so you know, And the truth is is that
I couldn't understand. We're jumping ahead a little bit, but
I couldn't understand why how it was so despicable and
yet nobody who had already been through it had come out,
as you know, publicly in a grand way. Because it's
not like it's been going on for a few years.

(03:22):
This is this has like been going on for close
to sixty years. It's not more right, if not more so.
So the truth I'm so sorry. I'm trying to I'm
trying to close this down and I'm so sorry. Podcasts,
bear with me, okay. So the truth is is that

(03:44):
I couldn't believe that it hadn't been done yet, and
so I but I now understand why. That's what it's
going to tell you is that I understand why because
when you've been living in that that stress and turmoil
and frustration and sadness in all the words, all the fields,
when it's over, it's over, you want to be You

(04:05):
don't want to look back.

Speaker 2 (04:07):
They don't want to speak out while their mom or
their dad or their grandmother is in the home, because
what might they do to them if I if I'm
going to the press and to elected officials while they're
in the home.

Speaker 3 (04:17):
Oh my god, I'm going to have to get them
out of there.

Speaker 2 (04:19):
And then once they've passed it, like your life, you've
already been drinking financially in many cases and of course emotionally.
So yeah, the victims of this, but they're not in
a position to really come out.

Speaker 3 (04:34):
So you have managed to. Thank God, you're a producer.

Speaker 2 (04:37):
He said, all right, well we're doing a documentary and
that's the end of this nonsense.

Speaker 1 (04:41):
Right, And honestly, I didn't think of it during the time.
So we back up a second. I was I was
is during COVID, towards the end of towards the almost
the end of COVID, not quite. But I have a
podcast called Love Conquers All's and it was based on
a project that I did with the Valerie Harper. It

(05:02):
was a short film called My Mom and the Girl,
which was based on my mom who had Alzheimer's, and
I watched Dope Sick. I don't know if you've seen
Dope Sick. It's administries on who and it was phenomenal.
And Peter Sarsgard is the main prosecutor, the federal prosecutor right.

Speaker 2 (05:21):
Who goes after the pharmaceutical company because they were complicit
in all the things that led up to all of
these people all over the contents content crisis.

Speaker 1 (05:32):
And Rick Montcastle was the man, the gentleman that Peter
Sarsgard was playing. And in the final episode, his partner
comes to and says, I think we have the next case.
And it's another pharmaceutical and it's called and they're going
to go up against Abbott Labs who are off marketing
a drug that they manufacturer called Depicoat and it's used

(05:58):
to basically chemical restrained people in nursing homes. And I
was like, well what, because that's exactly what happened to
my mom eight years tired. So my mom was although
she had Alzheimer's, she was completely healthy physically, and one
day she suddenly non vote, she's immobile, she's in continent,

(06:18):
she's barely there. And I, for a couple of months,
I had no idea. I thought her that her Alzheimer's
had progressed. And yeah, I found out that she's on
this drug that's a black labeled drug. It's actually for
anti seizure for epilepsy. So Rick Rick prosecuted them and
won a judgment of like one point five billion dollars,

(06:39):
one of the largest judgments against a single drug. And
I said, I got to have this man on my
on my podcast talking about chemical restraints because this is
something that's so prevalent and chemical restraint. This isn't just
a side note. It's actually really important to understand that
the chemical restraining not only is it is it abuse,

(07:02):
but it all but because it leads to neglect. So
if somebody so if they're using it to basically tether
your your loved one, your loved one's not going to
be moving for hours, could be sleeping. You've you've all,
we've all gone into places where you see zombies.

Speaker 3 (07:18):
What I callbody's out cold.

Speaker 1 (07:19):
They're all out cold because they're on you know, uh,
some kind of opiate.

Speaker 2 (07:24):
So they're putting it out with the idea of like, oh,
we're going to give them some sedatives so they don't
hurt themselves. Their patients were agitated or violent, but instead
it's like, well, if we give it all of them,
we don't have to serve lunch.

Speaker 1 (07:35):
We don't have to serve lunch. And they also don't
get if they're incontinent, they don't get changed. So they're
sitting in there, you know, pardon the bluntness, but they're
sitting in there. You're in they're sitting in their pieces,
and they're getting uties, you know, and they're getting bed sores,
which always.

Speaker 2 (07:53):
A red flag if you have someone in care and
you hear they're getting multiple UTI's, those things can happen,
but the so it's also a red flag to look forward.

Speaker 1 (08:01):
Like, really, so how often are they going They're emblematic
of neglect as is a bed sores are a never
event according to CMS, which is the centers for Medicare
and Medicaid. So that that right there tells you if
someone has if something, if a bed sore is gone
past stage one, there's stage there's four stages pages. Yeah,

(08:24):
they're called that's that is neglect, pure and simple and yeah.
So I'll just back up a little bit again about
Rick Mantcastle. When it came I had him onto my
podcast right in the throes of what was going on
with my mom. Basically she was not getting the care
she needed. She was going in and out of the hospital.

(08:45):
She was admitted into the hospital with a stage four
bed sore. Uh. And the hospital called me to tell
me this because they didn't want to take responsibility for it.

Speaker 3 (08:57):
They weren't talking right.

Speaker 1 (08:58):
So I called the nursing home, which is a five
star nursing home here in Los Angeles, and I said.

Speaker 3 (09:05):
Wait, this is a five star.

Speaker 2 (09:06):
This isn't some Oh we went to the terrible cheap
you know, cinderblock joint, one star. It's a bad place
in the terrible part of town. These things happened. This
was a five star, the highest rating nursing home. This
was supposed to be the nice place, the expensive place.

Speaker 1 (09:25):
The place that had a three year waiting list.

Speaker 3 (09:28):
Oh wow.

Speaker 1 (09:29):
Yeah. So the place that I used to say on
my podcast, I can sleep, I can sleep, I can
sleep at night. Mom is being taken care of.

Speaker 2 (09:37):
This was the posh place that everybody wants to go.
This is like, oh, we'll go to the good nursing home.

Speaker 1 (09:41):
Yeah, if you can get in. So I when I
called the nursing home and said, why is my mom?
Why didn't anyone tell me that she had a pressure store? Well,
it didn't happen here and that well on the way
to the hospital, of course, right the drive over. Yeah,
so the thing, you know, So that was the beginning

(10:01):
of the slippery slope for me. The bold face line,
the gas lighting, the things that, all the things, all
the things. She's eighty nine, she has Alzheimer's, She's okay,
we'll just give her morphine. Let's just keep her with
a feeding tube. She should have nothing by mouth, Like,
why don't we just like, let's just euthanize her then,

(10:23):
because what is she doing? What kind of life is this?
I could not wrap my head around it until I
had Rick Montcasselo on my podcast and he said, off
the line, he said, I want to talk to you
about what's going on with your mom because I also
prosecuted nursing homes federally for over twenty years. And he said,
what's happening to you is not an individual thing. It's

(10:46):
not just exclusive to your mom's facility. This is a
systemic crisis and it's.

Speaker 3 (10:51):
Been tapping all over the place.

Speaker 1 (10:53):
All the time. And he said, and then he proceeded
to tell me why and how and what, And I
was like, wh this is unbelievable that we don't know this,
this is unreal, so you know, and he basically explained
the business model why it was so bad. The fact
that there's there's a nursing home lobby who is extremely powerful,

(11:16):
more powerful than the pharmaceutical lobby.

Speaker 2 (11:20):
Just terrifying right there, because who's more powerful than the
pharmacutical lobby.

Speaker 1 (11:24):
NRA, that's about it, Yeah, but no, extremely powerful and
why and what makes them even more powerful is that
they're not on anyone's radar. And because there is so
much agism and ableism that has permeated our society and
our healthcare system. Because the healthcare system knows nothing about

(11:47):
elder care honestly, and particularly anything to do with dementia,
they are very there's very huge lack of knowledge and
education in that area. So people that have a cognitive
decline are massively marginalized and looked over, and it's very

(12:09):
easy to neglect and abuse them because they don't have
a voice.

Speaker 2 (12:12):
Sometimes well, also there's also the element of embarrassment and shame.
There are people who like, don't they don't want to
talk about it that they have a relative and a
nursing home or care facility because the people are going
to say, oh, you put them in home waiting your house,
and it's not realizing. It's like, oh, because I don't
have a hospital in my house and exactly exactly team
of nurses and equipment in my home day and people

(12:35):
are understanding.

Speaker 1 (12:36):
That, and thank you for saying that, because I've I've
had many people on social say to me, your mom
was suffering, why didn't you take her home? My mom
was in a nursing home because that was supposed to
be the safest place for her. Because most of us
don't aren't able to set up a hospital situation, not hospital,

(12:56):
but a situation where one who is immobile can be
turned carefully. You need two people. They need to be
taken out of the bed, to take a shower, to
get into a chair.

Speaker 2 (13:08):
Not everyone can do. What about the people who live
in studio apartments, so they're supposed to move both of
their parents and it.

Speaker 3 (13:14):
Doesn't have a reality for most people. And then what
do you do?

Speaker 2 (13:18):
And then if they do, if their Alzheimer's has progressed severely,
that's a very serious matter. You do need a professional
to work with them. One person by themselves cannot do this,
and medicaid you can.

Speaker 3 (13:29):
You want to the five star top home.

Speaker 1 (13:33):
Yeah, and Medicaid doesn't pay medical We're in California. Medicalcaid
doesn't pay for home care. So the chances are someone
who's lived long enough is going to run through their savings,
like my mom did.

Speaker 3 (13:46):
She I have friends like this, do I care for
my mother at home?

Speaker 2 (13:50):
My friend who's kept the probably watching this now, who
was caring for his mother at home? And then eventually
I because it became a thing of well, their insurance
covers this but not this, and covers that but not this.
So if you have her here, then you'd have to
pay for all of this with the money you do
not have. And if you put her here, that's like
what And so finally found a place that would take

(14:11):
her that was a decent place that he can visit her,
because it's like, no, I would have her home, but
it's not physically possible and it's not financially possible. They
won't pay for stuff. There's the complications that people face
trying to take care of their parents are unbelievable. And
then people are ashamed of embarrassed that people are ashamed
to embarrass anybody in their family is sick. People want

(14:33):
to talk about if somebody just just got sick and
was in the hospital. So people don't want to talk
about that they have a relative any nursing home, and
so they count on that element to also limit the
number of people who are going to say anything.

Speaker 1 (14:46):
Well, yeah, and it's done. It's such a disservice to
the people we love. And it's also, you know, a
disservice to our future self because when if we are
agist enablest, it's only you know, we're only doing a
disservice because because we will be there, so we.

Speaker 2 (15:04):
Are wait, wait you plan on undown when you get
hell out, somebody's gonnabout to put you somewhere.

Speaker 1 (15:08):
Right, So you are so you're being you. You are
an ist against yourself right and your future self. Whis
one of our experts who I love so much and
uh who says talks about agism and says that specific
thing as jan apple White who says, you know you

(15:28):
are just being You're just turning against your own future
self and that and how is that smart?

Speaker 2 (15:34):
Well, in the one of the reports, you said me
a quote from former First Lady from from Roslynd Carter
who said, there's four kinds of people in the world,
those that have been caregivers, those that are caregivers, those
who will be caregivers, and those who will need caregivers.
We're all we're going going to the big bed at
some point.

Speaker 1 (15:51):
It's an opportunity.

Speaker 3 (15:55):
We are long enough.

Speaker 2 (15:56):
Yay, it's unbelievable. So so you take your mother to
this place.

Speaker 3 (16:01):
This is the five story, is the it is the fancy,
it is.

Speaker 2 (16:03):
The expensive home. And when did you first notice things
going wrong?

Speaker 1 (16:09):
Well, I, you know, I think what was interesting, and
we we talked about it in the documentary, but we
also kind of minimized it a little bit because people
are so over COVID. But COVID really pulled the curtain
back on yeh and and and you know, we most
of us went through going like there were so many
times I would go to visit my mom and I,

(16:31):
you know, we live local, so I could see her
as much as I want, and I'd go in and
I'd think, hmm, she doesn't look right, or she's not bathed,
or you know, there's you can tell. But then you
kind of go you feel, should I complain just what
you were talking about before? And maybe I'm just being
stupid maybe.

Speaker 3 (16:48):
I'm being over protective.

Speaker 1 (16:50):
She's full exactly exactly. And then when COVID started and
no one's allowed in to see their loved ones, nobody
zero and with Fani, they finally set up a system
where you can zoom with your loved one once a week.
And when you're zooming with somebody who's got Alzheimer's, that's
not very helpful. Doesn't help them. They it's very difficult

(17:12):
for them to NAVI understand that what week by week.
My particular appointment was at three in the afternoon on
a Wednesday, And as the weeks went by, I saw
my mom in bed. She's never out of her room,
She's in bed during the day. She's not dressed, she's
still got a gown on it, and her hair is
like this, And I'm going, well, is my mom sick?

(17:33):
What's going on? The Sina who was facilitating the zoom
and she goes, I don't know, Susie, let me find
out from the nurse. I just don't know.

Speaker 3 (17:42):
And I don't know.

Speaker 1 (17:43):
We don't know, you know. And so when I finally
got to see her, it's like a year and a
half before most of us got in to see our
loved ones. That's a very long time, and most everybody
was isolated and locked in their rooms because they're understaffed,
because that is the business model, is to understaff, which
is the all the evil.

Speaker 3 (18:05):
This is the thing where it blew my mind.

Speaker 2 (18:07):
And I thought, you know, I knew something was up
because like everybody's understaffed everything. And I thought, well, yeah,
but there sure are a lot of people who work
in nursing who are looking for jobs. So something's going
wrong here, ah, because they're probably not paying them. Okay,
so they're understaff underfronted. But what you discovered in this
Stavist documentary, No Country for Old People, excellent title, because
so true that what has happened is the market has

(18:30):
been a venture capitalists and real estate investment trusts.

Speaker 3 (18:35):
That they're buying up the homes they're creating basically like
a shell corporation. So they're actually profiting.

Speaker 2 (18:44):
When you think about how much each per how many
people are in the home, and everyone's paying thousands of
dollars a month, they're actually pocketing the money and just
not buying old food and staff.

Speaker 3 (18:55):
Right.

Speaker 1 (18:55):
Even it's even more more, it's more crept than that.
Even it goes it really mirrors criminal enterprise. It's not
it's not anything different. They are these they're shielded. First
of all, there's no transparency. So these corporations and these
investment capitalists, they're they're shielded by their by their corporate veil. Right,
so there's no transparency. So they're there.

Speaker 3 (19:18):
You have no idea who really owns your nursing home.

Speaker 2 (19:20):
Never it says something on the sign that is not
who is running your nursing home.

Speaker 1 (19:24):
That's right. So then what they do is they they
do money laundry. So they set up these what's called
related parties. And the related parties, yes, and so those
that'll be the management company, that'll be the uh, the
agency for nurses, it'll be your pharmaceutical, it'll be your pharmacy.
All the things that you need they own, and then

(19:47):
they jack up the prices.

Speaker 2 (19:49):
Oh wait wait, this is the old company store thing,
so conflict of interest. So they own the nursing home
and the pharmacy. This supplies all the pills to all
the patients. And the agency that they called to hire
the nurses from the temp agency that sends over the
nurses and the.

Speaker 1 (20:05):
Real estate and all. And then they say and then CMS,
the senators for Medicare and Medicaid come down and say,
very performatively, you need to staff there needs a minimum staff.
We need to you know, we need.

Speaker 2 (20:19):
To we'd lunch laws about how much many staff there's
supposed to have.

Speaker 3 (20:23):
It's written down there are.

Speaker 1 (20:26):
That was established in nineteen eighty seven with the Nursing
Home Reform Act, which, by the way, Kirk Douglas I
just did a post about this. I found out that
he was doing a film. This is so interesting, you guys.
He did a TV movie called Amos and he was
playing and neglected an abused nursing home resident. He thought
that the script was exaggerated until the producer said, no, no, no,

(20:49):
we minimized it. So we get on TV. He marched
his butt to Congress and said, what is going on?
Like I thought they were joking. No, there's millions of
people worse than my character every single day, dying and
being tortured. Get your act together. And he was the one,
and they were like, well, what do you recommend, mister Douglas,

(21:11):
And he said, I'm an actor. I'm just being a bullhorn.
These people behind me are experts. You've got the answers,
let's do it like he was so verbal about it,
and by the way, he was so instrumental in getting
that bill passed. But now forty years later, it's the
same issues because there's no oversight, there's no enforcement, and

(21:33):
there's no.

Speaker 2 (21:33):
Penforce because there's rules about how many. But so they
come in and say you needed.

Speaker 3 (21:38):
To have the staff and then they say, yeah, yeah, sure, sure,
you don't have any money.

Speaker 1 (21:42):
We're broke. It's that we don't get enough from you know, Medicaid, Medicare.
We don't think it's not enough to actually take care
of these people, so we need more. Can you pay us?
Can you raise the billing? You know, when we build,
we don't get enough for that. And what they yes,
they do. There's more than an enough to pay. There's
more than enough to pay and also make money, not

(22:06):
even to make money.

Speaker 2 (22:08):
As I you know, flip through the the look tales
of horror UH one billion dollar Medicare fraud and money
laundering scheme.

Speaker 3 (22:16):
There was one mention.

Speaker 2 (22:18):
About in New York that UH pressing charges against a
home in New York, and it was something about that.
It was like, oh, no, we're we don't have enough money.
To pay the staff, and they found it was something
about eighty three million dollars in profit they were in
fact making.

Speaker 1 (22:32):
Yeah, that's a little bit, by the way, that's in
the billions and trillions.

Speaker 3 (22:35):
So that's a small that was one that was like
one place.

Speaker 1 (22:38):
That's a but there it is. There's so much money
and that the lobby. You know, first of all, why
why are we still in the same position. Why doesn't
traditional advocacy work? You know, there's there's tons of amazing groups.
We our fiscal sponsor who helped us, you know, with
a with a five O one C three status so

(22:59):
we can raise They are the national consumer Voice for
quality long term care and Ralph Nader helped launch them
in seven, nineteen seventy four. They're still fighting for the
same things they've been going to Congress for year after
year after year. Why doesn't it? Why are there no changes?
Because lobby lobby, lobby is paying millions and millions of

(23:20):
dollars into our publish campaign.

Speaker 2 (23:22):
They were ports in multiple states are trying state by
state to pass stop and that.

Speaker 3 (23:28):
Was in New York.

Speaker 2 (23:29):
New York Attorney General Letitia James filed a lawsuit. They
had four nursing homes and there was a pattern of
residents not receiving care suf for neglect, mistreatment, humiliation, et cetera.
They had been depriving the nursing homes of over eighty
three million dollars that was intended for resident care.

Speaker 1 (23:47):
Yes, by the way, folks, you're paying for that.

Speaker 3 (23:50):
That comes away charge.

Speaker 1 (23:54):
So if it doesn't distribute about older people, let it
disturb you that that's your money that they're taking. And
it's not it's not earmarked for them. It's earmarked for
you and your loved ones when you need it now.

Speaker 3 (24:09):
And these are related parties.

Speaker 2 (24:11):
These multiple shell corporations in Michigan use at ninety eight
nursing home to Michigan paid related parties.

Speaker 3 (24:18):
I guess with the pharmacy and the.

Speaker 1 (24:20):
Agency and pop.

Speaker 2 (24:21):
Yeah, five hundred and forty four point five million over
two year period and there was no oversight about that happening.
I think, yeah, it's it's a twelve hour shift because
they have so few nurses. An average staff member gets
about twenty five minutes per percon under the current staff.

Speaker 3 (24:40):
And this is this is at the good place.

Speaker 2 (24:42):
So they're taking the money, they're getting the money because
people are either paying it privately or the medicare is kicking.
And they're not only keeping it, they're purchasing all the
companies that do any business so that they're making.

Speaker 3 (24:56):
It coming and going in sideways.

Speaker 1 (24:58):
It's called tunneling. They're tunneling, tunneling, They're tunneling the funds
and and and they get away with it. It's it's
it's legal. It's a legal fraud, if that makes sense.

Speaker 3 (25:12):
Because it's a loophole.

Speaker 2 (25:13):
They have found a loophole on the look system, exploiting
to gain the system.

Speaker 1 (25:19):
And what they're doing. And I hesitate saying this because
I used to not say it out loud, but I'm
going to say it out loud because all the other
experts do. They are ware housing our loved ones, and
they are ware housing people that are vulnerable. And because
they do not have a voice.

Speaker 3 (25:34):
And they don't they're not going to complain. What are
they going to do? Who they gonna tell?

Speaker 1 (25:38):
They don't have a choice either. When my mom, when
I was very distressed and I was saying, my mother
wants to eat, take this tube out of her and
let me feed her. She's not asked. Brady and even
if she does this, that's a better life than this.
They said, we understand your stressed. You can take her home. Well,
they know you can't take her home, so what are

(25:58):
you gonna do? They they there's you really have no recourse.
Even though there's an Umbudsman you know, program that's in
place in all of our states. It's it's pretty much
ninety percent volunteers, so there's not a lot of money
behind it.

Speaker 2 (26:16):
There's no professional people working as on budsmen these are and.

Speaker 1 (26:20):
By the way, they're Nbudsmen program. There's the most amazing people.
They are, and I say this with love and respect.
They're toothless because of the system the way it is.

Speaker 2 (26:31):
Because they're trying, but they won't let them do anything
exactly exactly, and there's not enough of them and they
only can help so much, you know.

Speaker 1 (26:41):
And then when there's a crisis like you know, horrible
crisises that need to be attended to. Nowick, if you
had a child in the same situation, there'd be a
whole system barging in around it. You'd have child protective
services there in the middle of the night. If you
call adult protective services in the middle night and say

(27:01):
a resident was found on the floor, bloodied and raped.
What do we do? Can you just give me the
name and everything. We'll do a report and then I'll
get back to it in a couple of days. What
that's what happens? Because no nobody cares and the owners
don't care because now that just becomes a drain on

(27:24):
the resource. It's terrible, I feel like because I feel
like I'm just like the Debbie Downer the.

Speaker 3 (27:33):
Hardware room with it.

Speaker 2 (27:35):
So in this documentary, which now this documentary is already
aired on Amazon, it's a it's going to be airing
all the cable and network. So roku, what have you?

Speaker 3 (27:46):
What do we see?

Speaker 2 (27:46):
What do we learn in this documentary? Because it covers
your mother's case and the general sacking and divillaging.

Speaker 1 (27:52):
All that stuff, You're going to learn so much that
you didn't know and and stuff that you really need
to know because you don't want to go into this
industry and go through a journey like I did without
having any other knowledge. Because you should know your rights.
You should know what you can and can't do, so
you don't put yourself in a vulnerable position, or at

(28:13):
least mitigate as much as you can right, and also
don't get your cortisol levels so high as you're thinking
that you know, my god, what am I doing and
what planet am I on? Is this actually happening? I
don't understand, like where's the humanity? So understand where it's
coming from. Understand that probably that CNA is just burnt
out and they're having moral injury because they can't figure,

(28:35):
they can't do the job that they want to do right.
So it gives you compassion for what these people are
going through. However, it also lets you know that you
have to be a strong advocate and even then you
might not be able to succeed in the way you
want to, in the way that the model, the business
model is. Now what we need to do, and this

(28:58):
is what we talk about towards the end in the
third episode, towards the end, we talk about, you know,
what can we do as a as a collective, as
a community, because we've lost community. So you know, we've
started a movement, a project called ROAR, which is respect, Oversight,
Advocacy and reform nice calling for all roarriors to come

(29:23):
aboard and roar for people who don't have a voice,
and this kind of change it's got to be a
collective movement. It has to be. It has to be
the only currency that we have is as constituents. And
but that's powerful. So how can we go how can
we circumvent, you know, and get in front of the

(29:44):
lobby that's with our constitute.

Speaker 3 (29:45):
You have to creat your a lobby, absolutely. I mean
you've talked about five three.

Speaker 2 (29:49):
I presume you have a five O one C four
and so yeah, because you have to have it.

Speaker 3 (29:53):
You have the only way to fight this when you have.

Speaker 2 (29:55):
Industries like this and have these enormous lobbies is to
create a lobby for the citizens, for the victims of
these laws and these loopholes, to go in and and
do battle. So is their legislation currently pending that can
alleviate any.

Speaker 3 (30:11):
Of this madness? I'm seeing like some state by state
stuff they're trying.

Speaker 1 (30:15):
This is the problem is that that, yes, for instance,
there's a there's I'm very dear and near and dear
to my heart is the Caregiver Essential Caregiver Act, which
is basically because about two hundred thousand nursing home residents
during COVID died before their time. They died before their
time from failure to thrive, not from illness, not from COVID,

(30:37):
but from failure to thrive because they were kept isolated, and.

Speaker 3 (30:42):
There were people were neglected in there when when.

Speaker 2 (30:44):
They got COVID, it was like, and if they get COVID,
you're bringing in the doctors and getting the directs.

Speaker 3 (30:49):
Now they weren't. They just didn't yet they.

Speaker 1 (30:53):
Didn't drink A daunting number though, right, Alison, I mean
two hundred thousand. And did you ever hear that number before?
Like I didn't until I started doing my research. That's
a huge number. That's like enough, that's a war. That's
a war, and no one's talking about it. And these
are people, these are people that died alone. I asked
my expert who gave me that number, and how many

(31:13):
died alone? He said all of them probably, So that
that is so tragic and so heinous and criminal and
all the bad words, and and you know, so we
we can't we can't fight it that way. We can't
fight what the way we were. We have to really

(31:36):
get in and oh, you were talking about the let
me go back, and I went off track for a second.
Because of the Central Caregiver Act, I've seen that get
so close, there was so much, you know, so that
they could get in that. So if there's another you know,
very if there's another pandemic, somebody that is a designated caregiver,
family member, designated caregiver can get in provided just like

(32:01):
it doesn't.

Speaker 3 (32:02):
Have a test, have the gloves, have the mask, but
be allowed it.

Speaker 1 (32:04):
Are allowed in. Who would say no to that? Who?
Why it's only helping the places because you're alleviating some
of the stress. Right fifty states that's been going on
since COVID. I actually did a video, an advocacy video
for them from every state and it got it gets

(32:26):
you know, it gets looked at, it gets it gets delivered,
and then it gets killed. So if something like that
so benign that costs no money, it only makes sense,
could save money because you're there as a free caregiver.
How does that not get passed? So the truth is

(32:49):
is that we need to make sure that whatever regulations
and legislation that's that does get past or that already
is in place, is is there's check and balances we
need to there's.

Speaker 3 (33:01):
No enforcement Because you're saying there was that Elder Care
Act that was.

Speaker 2 (33:04):
Passed after Kirk Douglas's you know out cry that there's
just no enforcement of it. There's laws and there's no
there's no the inspections are not happening. And tell me
I would do they only do they only company that
sends up to people that do the inspections stop.

Speaker 1 (33:18):
In or they pay them off or they pay them
and they don't they'll know that there, or they'll alert
the e facility that they're going to be there on
a certain day and then everything is delicious and beautiful,
and you know, they'll you know, it's it's it's so
it's so egregious, it's it's you can't imagine it unless

(33:40):
it was true. Like I can't make this stuff up.

Speaker 3 (33:44):
I cannot.

Speaker 2 (33:46):
So our lawsuits being filed is more legislation being proposed.

Speaker 1 (33:50):
Well, the lawsuits are so so minimal anyway, there's there's
there's caps in every state, so so you know, but that's.

Speaker 3 (33:58):
Doing a nursing home. This would be like suing these companies.

Speaker 2 (34:02):
As criminal criminally because if you're suing just a nursing home,
but that they're no suing the company that owns the
eighty seven businesses and they try to find.

Speaker 3 (34:11):
Them, who are they?

Speaker 1 (34:13):
Who are they In California, there was a franchise by
and owned by a man named Shlomo and it was
Brias is the franchise and he actually had his license
remo revoked and he continued, he stated about.

Speaker 3 (34:32):
The no enforcement, the license was are vote and he
was still going and.

Speaker 1 (34:36):
He was paying off someone that we know in Sacramento.
So there's that. So you know, my my whole thing
is like we as constituents, we need to shame our politicians.
We need to tell them we know it that you're
taking you know, pay you're that you're being paid off
to look away, to kill bills that are and not

(34:57):
to enforce them. And it's it's unacceptable. And that's it.
That's the only that's the power we have. And when
I say it's the only power, it's it's very potent.
That's the way other changes changes have been made. You
have to take it to the streets. You have to
let them know you're not taking You're not going to
take this anymore.

Speaker 3 (35:17):
You know.

Speaker 1 (35:18):
I love Jane Fondas so much. She's endorsed our project.
She's badass and she gets it right, and so does
Lily Tomlin, so does Liza gibbons y see you've got
it up. And Danny Strong, who's responsible for Dope Sick,
And these are people that get it. They get how
important it is for people to come together as a
collective and say no more, that's it, we can't.

Speaker 2 (35:43):
And it's just, you know, it's just amazing when I
look at this, like how many shit it's all over
the country. It's just the amount of money that these
companies are pocketing. A twenty twenty three study found that
nationwide in twenty nineteen, nursing homes paid the related parties
alone other point twenty three billion, not million billion. The

(36:04):
nine point fifty four percent of nursing homes total net
operate revenues were preaid to that. It's it's absolutely bananas.
These related party transactions is where they're literally hiding hundreds
of thousands of dollars and endless investigations with citation and

(36:25):
everything else. Here substantial and widespread et cetera, et cetera.
Federal Medicare cost reports in Michigan, between twenty one to
twenty three, nursing homes paid one point two billion related
party companies.

Speaker 3 (36:37):
That's in one state.

Speaker 1 (36:38):
That's in one state, Folks, that's.

Speaker 3 (36:39):
In one state was one point two billion.

Speaker 1 (36:43):
Oh no, we interviewed a whistleblower and we kept her
shielded in our documentary for this was a franchise in Uh,
maybe I shouldn't say. The state doesn't matter. They they
they had a judgment of three point five million dollars
judgment against them after this eleven year case. Eleven years.

Speaker 2 (37:03):
Eleven years, so everyone has died by the end of
forget about that.

Speaker 1 (37:09):
Forget about that. And then they file for bankruptcy.

Speaker 3 (37:13):
They file for bankruptcy.

Speaker 1 (37:15):
Uh huh, and then they opened reopen under another name.

Speaker 3 (37:19):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (37:21):
And that's that is that's protocol. They do that all
day long. They do it all day long.

Speaker 2 (37:28):
And you went in when you first started, you said,
with your mother you were a normal, innocent person who
had no idea this sort of thing was going on.
You picked, you said, there was the five star, You
picked the good and then just everything went t hell
a handcart. So your documentary said, this is so people
can learn from the hell that you went through.

Speaker 1 (37:46):
Learn And yeah, we have to.

Speaker 3 (37:49):
We have to.

Speaker 1 (37:50):
We have to look at what's going on. And it
is because listen, my mom and I used to joke
about it all the time, and la la la la,
la la la. You know we're not going to die.
That's for other folks, right, come on, mom, let's go
go shopping, you know were and my mom would go, yeah,
we not going. We are not into it, you know.
And the truth is you could joke about it all

(38:11):
day long, but it's going to happen. And so we
all look, you know, we we other it other other
other until we're in it. And when you're in it
and it's crisis time, that's the worst time to make decisions,
Like you cannot make a good decision when you're in crisis.
And you have to take care of yourself as a
caregiver too, because it is so hard, the just the

(38:33):
emotions alone and then just the time that you're putting
into it, and then not to achieve something for someone
that you love and watch them suffer. Is no one
should go through that. It is it's it's it's life
altering To say that this.

Speaker 2 (38:50):
Is enormous now because as we know, the Boomer generation
are now all into their seventies, in their eighties, this
is now all hitting the fan for every one of
a certain age, my in true parents around this is
only going to increase, and I imagine that the people
who do this are seeing the profit margin from that.

Speaker 1 (39:09):
Oh gosh. Yeah. And by the way, I just want
to say, it's not only older people in long term care.
There's people that are disabled who, by the grace of God,
you know, like any one of us, could be disabled
tomorrow and need to take advantage of long term care.
We did interview three different people, you know, in their

(39:32):
forties who who are having a hell of a time,
awful time in long term care, probably worse because they're vocal.

Speaker 3 (39:43):
And that's true. I also know someone who's my age.

Speaker 2 (39:47):
And people have strokes, People have strokes, people getting car accidents.

Speaker 3 (39:51):
People wind up.

Speaker 2 (39:52):
In long term care for multiple reasons, even if people
who are not elderly, And then what.

Speaker 1 (39:56):
And then what? And also another thing, and this is
something I learned as well, is that rehab centers, which
are also you know, run under the same system. So
many people, healthy people who are just going maybe like
you said, have a fall, they break a shoulder, they
break it, and they go in for rehab and they
don't come out. I've heard that story so many times.

(40:18):
My daughter's they my daughter went to one of her
dear friend's father's funeral, who was a director, and like
before his time, he had a heart attack. He was fine,
he went into rehab, and every time she was her daughter,
my daughter's friend went in there to see she kind
of talk to him, your mom, I don't know what's
going on. My dad's looking worse and worse every day,
like he was fine, and sure enough he died, you know.

(40:41):
And so I've heard this story so many times. So
I tried to tell people careful with rehab as well,
because rehabs are they're run the same way they're they're
also owned.

Speaker 2 (40:52):
That makes sense because I have a friend when I
was I was going to interview before like a few
months ago, and then something came up and I was
talking to a friend of mine, an actress who had
post a procedure gone into a rehab.

Speaker 3 (41:04):
Older lady but like like still working, like active, and
I talked towards her. She said, I'm I'm going to
leave on Saturday.

Speaker 2 (41:12):
I'm going to be here so many days and then
I'm going to leave, whether they say I can or not,
because this place is bad news. They're abusing the patients.
There's people who have not been taken to the bathroom.
There's all kinds of weird stuff going on in this place,
and I am out of here if I have to
like climb out a window because there's something terribly terribly
wrong with this place.

Speaker 3 (41:33):
And she got out.

Speaker 2 (41:34):
She did go home, and she was okay, but she said,
oh no, this is how people wind up in here
and and don't get out. There's something wrong with this
place and what they're doing to people.

Speaker 1 (41:43):
Yeah, it's really, it's really so important that we that
are still you know, healthy at Knockwood and can learn
about it and then speak about it and amplify it.
It really is just so important because it's it's it's
it's it's a humane issue. This is a human human
issue that if we don't stop it now with like

(42:07):
you know, the the trope of the gray tsunami, as
you know, as we're talking about, we will My girlfriend
just did a film on a short film on granny dumping,
which sounds so awful, right, but it's it is a
real phenomenon. And without infrastructure that can handle the gray tsunami,

(42:28):
that's going to happen more and more so. People go
into the hospital because Medicare will take you for whatever
it is, depending on what it is for thirty sixty
ninety days. But when that's done and you don't have
a place to go, they're going to put you on
the street and go.

Speaker 2 (42:43):
That's happened here in La. There's been things on the
news where the police said, why are we finding this
elderly woman wandering the streets?

Speaker 3 (42:49):
What is happening because people.

Speaker 1 (42:51):
They have no place to go?

Speaker 2 (42:52):
What can someone washing checking out a rehabit, checking elder
care at nursing home.

Speaker 3 (42:57):
What can you do?

Speaker 1 (42:58):
We? You know?

Speaker 2 (42:58):
So, I mean, obviously we need to get loigious paths.
We need to get them to budget for enforcement. That's
anybody wants to spend money for enforcement. I know that
from like the child abuse law dealing with that.

Speaker 3 (43:08):
It's like, okay, pass the law and how are we
in faalsing this?

Speaker 2 (43:10):
Are you going to pay for the needs to go
rest them with no you see getting enforcement? But what
does someone do if now watching this, they're now completely
terrified and they're like, I'm about to have surgery, I
have to go to rehab, I'm about to take my
mother to a nursing home.

Speaker 3 (43:25):
What can they at least look for?

Speaker 2 (43:26):
What questions can they ask to at least try to
find a place where they're not going to be rupt completely.

Speaker 1 (43:33):
So I wish I could give you a pat answer
for that. I can't. There you can go and look up.
There's you know, different different organizations that will have lists
of the star ratings for different nursing homes. The troubles
is that they can buy those.

Speaker 3 (43:50):
Ratios five start. It was a time wreck, right.

Speaker 1 (43:54):
I don't want to be again Debbie Downer. But what
right now? It's so difficult because it's really hard to
decipher which one is good, which is one is bad?
So ask people and then ask people that are actually
involved with their family member. Because I when I talk
to people who said this said place was great and

(44:15):
you must get your mom and there, they weren't involved
with their cares.

Speaker 3 (44:18):
You didn't have anybody in there.

Speaker 1 (44:20):
Well they did, they may have, but they bought the lobby,
is what they did. And so they felt good about
it because they bought the lobby, but they weren't involved
with really the caregiving and weren't there. They were there,
you know, like holiday families members. Right, So so where
if you're very involved with your family, find out from
other members of you know, have people that residents that

(44:43):
live there talk to their customers. How are you liking it?
What do you think? Have you had any issues? Has
your loved one gone to the hospital, have they had bedstors?
How many UTIs do they get? Are they enjoying themselves?
Do they look like they're thriving and they they're happy?
You know, and ask them, don't rely on the lobby

(45:03):
that looks like a hotel. Don't rely on the people
that are selling you on it because.

Speaker 2 (45:07):
Of for the staff gotright, I ask.

Speaker 1 (45:13):
Ask to walk inside and talk to talk to the residents,
talk to the residence family members, Like I said, that's
where that's where you're going to get the truth from.

Speaker 2 (45:21):
And that would be like I mean, if you do
deep dive on the internet for things you look for
and you go, okay, it's a rating, but I know
that like, for instance, when you search doctors, there's like
lots of really interesting places you can find out things
about your doctors. You can quickly see like complaints and
you can tell really quickly from people's writing complaints which
are a bogus somebody's whining complaint, which is like a
serious complaint, especially when there's a lot of them.

Speaker 1 (45:43):
The same, the same kinds. Yes, yeah, you will.

Speaker 3 (45:46):
Look for that.

Speaker 2 (45:47):
I know that with doctors, and I found I found
this out. My own doctor told me this because he said,
there's a website you can go to and see exactly
how much money your doctor has accepted from a pharmaceutical company,
because he said, the represents from pharmaceutical companies quite sensibly,
quite rightly.

Speaker 3 (46:06):
They go visit doctors.

Speaker 2 (46:07):
And they take them to lunch and say have you
tried this new fabulous pace. And normally what happens is
the doctor goes, yeah, yes, or find whatever, give me
some samples and says it makes a.

Speaker 3 (46:18):
Decision based on competent medical care.

Speaker 2 (46:21):
But sometimes to go to doctors and they say, I
can get you a new seat. Of golf clubs, I
can get to a membership, but a thing I got,
They got tricks, they got prizes.

Speaker 1 (46:32):
Watch dope, sick you guys, watch dope.

Speaker 3 (46:36):
Take all kinds of stuff. And then when their patients
come and they go, oh, you don't want pill A, B,
C or D, you want pill X. And because.

Speaker 2 (46:46):
Set of golf clubs, and doctor was like, you could
look it up, because he said, you can look up
and see that I allowed them to buy me a
tuna sandwich because what he is?

Speaker 3 (46:57):
He said.

Speaker 2 (46:58):
They come, I say, okay, fine, I'll go to lunch
with you, but we have to eat in the cafeteria,
and they says they really hate that.

Speaker 3 (47:04):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (47:04):
Yeah, you can also they have any if they have
any lawsuits against them, you can look that. You can't,
you know, most of us don't think about that, and
and that that could be obviously very telling.

Speaker 2 (47:17):
Right now, if you pull something up and you already
see the lawsuits, that's that's like, yeah, I would think
that would be a giant red flag.

Speaker 1 (47:25):
Although they could say, and one could say, well those
are you know, people who are just you know, wackadoo,
who are.

Speaker 3 (47:33):
Such frivolous lawsuits?

Speaker 2 (47:34):
They what about? You would see if you looked how
many there were, and you would eventually see what they were.

Speaker 1 (47:40):
For, right.

Speaker 3 (47:42):
Right?

Speaker 1 (47:43):
Yeah, So I mean one deep, you'd have to really look.

Speaker 2 (47:46):
You'd have to like literally sit there and go through
and read everything. Go okay, well here's a complaint page.

Speaker 3 (47:50):
But I don't know who these people are, so you'd
have to look at multiple sources.

Speaker 2 (47:54):
And then, as you said, you'd have to somehow get
in there and talk to people who actually staying there.

Speaker 1 (47:58):
And actually know. Yeah, you have to know what your
rights are and where you can look for that. For instance,
when my mom was taken taken to an emergency hospital,
I talked about the documentary. The admitting doctor told me
my mom had failure to thrive. This was way early on,
and I was like, what are you talking about? She
just they told me she's fine. Yeah, she's failure to thrive.

(48:19):
So what do you want to do? We intubated her.
I'm like, why did you intubate her? Have her on
no intubation? Like no, well you want us to remove it?
I said, well, yeah, she's really going to die, you know,
And they were the whole family there. We took the
tube out, she looked like death warmed over. It turned
out she was on a fentanyl drip.

Speaker 3 (48:43):
Did she have answer? Was she in terrible paint?

Speaker 1 (48:45):
No? And I didn't even notice because I'm like a
basket case because my mommy's dying and I wasn't prepared that. No,
and my niece came in and said, Aunt, Susie, nanny's
not feeling anything because she's on a fentanyl drip. And
I was like why. I called the doctor, who, by
the way, I never saw I And I said, why

(49:06):
should a fentanel trip, Well, she's allergic to morphine? First
of all, no, she's not. Second of all, why she
need to be on that? So, you know, I said,
when does she When do you suppose she's going to
pass away? And he said in a couple hours to
a day tops, four days go by. She has no water,
no oxygen, no no food, nothing. She's not dying. She

(49:29):
wakes up through the fentanyl drip and is like smiling,
she's and I'm going I called the doctor. I go,
you know, I don't feel we don't feel good about this.
Something's wrong. And so I said. He goes, well, you
know her organs have probably shut down by now, and
that's there's no turning back. I said, well, I'm sure
there's a test for that. Can you test her?

Speaker 3 (49:48):
You're just saying probably you can check, right, So my uh, he.

Speaker 1 (49:52):
Goes, well, start this whole thing all over again. You know,
it's just gonna have to be hospital. I said, what
are you talking about? Stop, stop, stop, I don't know
what you talking about. Just get her, just take the
test and find out where she's at. So I told
my daughter. We had gone to take a shower after
three days, right, and I said, we're not taking the shower.
Let's go back there because I don't know if something's wrong.

(50:13):
I go back there, my mom is out again, like
not up anymore. And I look in the fentanyl drip
still dripping, and then the nurse flies in and she goes, well,
I'm taking your mom off fentanyl doctor's orders. And the
doctor calls me and he goes, hey, I've been thinking
about what she said. And he goes, you know, I
don't think we have a right to euthanize your mom.
And and then as far as I know, it's not

(50:35):
legal in this state. And I was like, wait, first
of all.

Speaker 3 (50:40):
The United State.

Speaker 1 (50:41):
Yeah, And so that was when my heart went into
my stomach and I was like, I knew I felt
something wrong. So and I'm telling you all the story
because I later found out after you know, going and
talking to professionals, they did a deep search on him
and he had lost He was on probate for drug
and alcohol use. That doctor.

Speaker 3 (51:03):
Hence the figital drip. Right, we don't know into it.
It's horrifying.

Speaker 2 (51:10):
Okay, So how do people get hold of you shockingly.
We're running out of time. How do people get hold
of you? How do they see the documentary?

Speaker 1 (51:17):
And okay, see the documentary. Please go just watch it.
I know it's gonna be hard, but I promise you
won't be left horrible.

Speaker 3 (51:23):
No Aleixandry for old People, No Country for Old People.
It's on Amazon and apparently multiple of them.

Speaker 1 (51:28):
A bunch of everything, and it's going to be on
a bunch of other anyway, follow us, follow me, Cusy
Singer Carter. I'm on all of the platforms, all the
social medias, and there's also No Country for Old People.
You'll find that. It might say doc after it, might
say film after it. But we're on TikTok and Insta
and Facebook and x and YouTube, and you'll find us

(51:53):
and watch it. And if you feel like you it
was worthy and worthwhile, please review and because that will
tell Amazon to push it out more. And and you
know it's documentaries are not moneymakers, they're change makers. So
that's what I'm here to do.

Speaker 3 (52:11):
All right. Thank you.

Speaker 2 (52:12):
This has been absolutely horrifying, but thank you for bringing
this out. I have so many friends who are going
through this right now, and this is information people desperate
lyn me because I said you went to the five
star and it was still completely ghastly. Thank you all right,
so this is the Alison arnswer So that was Susie
Singer card. Thank you, thank you so much, and I'm

(52:36):
Alison Arber