Paramus hospital provides a home built around Korean culture

Monday, June 29, 2009

BY SACHI FUJIMORI
NorthJersey.com
STAFF WRITER



Sang Soon Moon is 90 and proud of her cabbages, sprouting on a small patch of dirt on the grounds of Bergen Regional Medical Center. She recently plucked enough to share with other residents in the hospital's long-term-care unit. Sprinkling soy sauce on top, she said that her friends "really enjoyed it."

Moon has seven grown children scattered from Alpine (NJ) to Seoul, but home for her is the innovative Korean Long Term Care Service that the Paramus hospital established in 2004 following requests from community leaders. Bergen County is home to 36,000 Korean-Americans, the fourth-largest concentration in the country, according to 2000 Census figures.

"I must be blessed by God that the nurses are very kind and taking care of me," Moon said on a recent afternoon, speaking through a staff member who translated.

Traditionally, it's frowned upon in Asian cultures to place family members in a nursing home, but Jinna Kim — executive director of Eden Healthcare, the Paramus-based organization that advised the hospital on the unit — hosted seminars in the community about the benefits of long-term care.

"We persuaded families it's beneficial for both parties."

A Korean flag, pure white with a red-and-blue yin-yang in the center, flaps outside of an aging building on the hospital campus. Inside, its 120 Korean residents, two-thirds of them women, live surrounded by familiar comforts. The nurses and social workers are fluent in Korean. Their chef, Sook Lee, hired to cook exclusively for the unit, serves favorites like cow feet soup, bracken — a leafy green vegetable — and the mealtime staple, kimchi, pickled and fermented cabbage. "They're always requesting a lot of vegetables," Lee said.

Traditional Korean artwork covers the walls, along with tourist posters from their home country. The beds are lower to the floor. A computer in the recreation area is set to Korean-language mode for easy Internet surfing, and the television broadcasts Korean news and soap operas.

Their quality of life is boosted by intangible benefits as well, Kim said. Prayer services are held six days a week, Korean holidays are celebrated, and the staff understands the nuances of their culture. "Respect for elder adults is very important," Kim said.

On a recent afternoon after prayer services, grandmothers pushing walkers formed a bottleneck outside the elevator. Later in the day they shared plates of pastel rice cakes, celebrating the first birthday of a staff member's granddaughter.

The hospital has no plans for other ethnic-specific units.

But it's a model for elder care as two significant demographic shifts sweep the country. The population is becoming grayer and more ethnically diverse, said Emily Greenfield, a professor of social work at Rutgers and the university's gerontology program coordinator.

"By offering this option for Korean elders there's more potential to build upon their strengths for a better quality of life, such as creating more opportunities for meaningful relationships, and shared communal events," she said. "We know social relationships are important to health regardless of age or setting."

Hospital administrators say that residents of the unit are highly active, even into their 90s. One man slips on his golf cleats and practices his short game on a patch of grass. And their families and community members are very involved. "We have a huge volunteer contingent from the community, church groups, choirs, pastors, and some families visit almost every day," said Young Lee, a staff member.

A few years ago a group of residents decided on their own to plant some seeds on a strip of land off the parking lot.

The once-empty lot has morphed over the years into an elaborate garden with neat rows and wire mesh to keep the rabbits out.

"It revitalizes them and brings back memories from when they were younger and had an agricultural life," Kim said.

Ken Pyo Hung, who is 93, can be seen in sweat pants walking laps around the hospital campus most days.

"It makes me healthy so I can work in my garden," Hung said.



E-mail: fujimori@northjersey.com

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God bless them!

What a great story; and a great idea from the hospital
for their ethnic appreciation, as long as their Korean
heritage doesn't make them feel isolated or segregated.

93, and still able to work in the garden?
We should all end up so healthy.


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that is seriously awesome. makes me want to live there. gerontology is one of my passions (probably should have pursued it as a career, but my brother persuaded me NOT to be a social worker.) it's good to see that there are care facilities for the elderly that are not just places to languish but places to thrive.

Hi,
there is a Korean Owned and operated on in maple shade NJ.

(856) 779-1360

315 W Mill Rd, Maple Shade, NJ‎

Lord of Hope Silvertown.

I am pretty sure they don't have a kimchee cabbage garden, but they have a korean cook, and it seems that many are transferring their korean speaking elderly there.

Sam