Who says infirm means immobile?
Dorothy Norton, 80, was recovering from a stroke when she joined Priscilla Kenney’s Alaskan cruise. Although other residents at the adult family home raved about Kenney’s Travel with Angels excursions, Norton had big doubts. How, she wondered, could Kenney cope with wheelchairs and luggage and still get everyone to the airport on time?
“I thought: ‘This woman is nuts. She can’t do this.’ But once I got on the plane, I was impressed,” Norton said.
She loved the cruise, the scenery and the private party on the ship for their group. When she got home, she signed up for the next trip. And the next and the next.
Kenney, who owns the Golden Hearth adult family home in Woodinville, has been offering adventures to the infirm, incontinent and elderly for more than a decade.
Typical traveler woes pale beside Kenney’s challenges. A lineup of eight or more wheelchairs can cause traffic jams at airport security.
After 12 years, Kenney said, she’s gotten better at juggling oxygen tanks, adult diapers and medical charts. She hasn’t lost a suitcase or a traveler yet.
“The first trip we had 60 pieces of luggage,” she said. “Now we all use big suitcases and one per person.”
Kenney, a registered nurse experienced in geriatric care, devotes one day apiece to prep each traveler. That includes updated medical records and signed permission from the patient’s doctor and family. She takes the client shopping for clothes for formal dinners on the cruises and bathing suits for poolside activities. She packs for them.
This is a woman who almost bypassed geriatrics.
When she first shifted from hospital work to home health care, she told her supervisor she didn’t want to do geriatric nursing. They ignored that request and after her first week visiting the elderly, Kenney was hooked.
“That was before the state regulated homes, and some were terrible,” she said. “I’d take care of someone’s medical needs and then I’d go home and cry.”
One day she visited a woman in Woodinville who was ready to go to a nursing home but unable to find one. The woman’s 6,400-square-foot house was perfect, Kenney decided, for an adult family home. She went back to the health-care office and removed herself from the case so there wouldn’t be a conflict of interest. She bought the house, and the homeowner became her first resident when Kenney started Golden Hearth in 1996. She now cares for eight residents.
She started traveling with the entourage because her new business had no handicapped-accessible bathrooms.
“I decided to take all the residents on a cruise and get all the bathrooms renovated while we were gone,” Kenney said.
When she couldn’t find any travel companies that specialized in handicapped groups, Kenney organized the trip herself.
On that first trip to the Caribbean and Honduras, the ship’s stabilizers failed. Staff pushed wheelchairs up and down decks that inclined at odd angles. While it was physically challenging for the nurses and aides, Kenney could see a big difference in the clients.
“One dementia patient would wake up each morning showing more life than she ever had at home. She would want to know what was on the agenda for the day. The transformation was so dramatic,” Kenney said. “She went from comatose to participant.”
Since then she’s taken groups on cruises to Alaska, Mexico and the Cayman Islands, and to resorts in Hawaii, Arizona, Mexico and to closer destinations such as Napa Valley, British Columbia and the Washington Coast. She usually plans two to three major trips a year, which might include anything from swimming with dolphins to luaus to spa treatments.
One man wanted to join the trip to Hawaii but his doctor said he shouldn’t travel with his failing heart. His family overruled the doctor, telling Kenney the man was dying anyhow. They told her to just put his body on ice if he died. The man had a wonderful time and survived the trip.
Sometimes family members accompany the group. Kenney advertises occasionally but says most of her clients are referrals. The best advertising, she said, happens when they’re traveling. When people see the wheelchairs and walkers, they want to send their elderly relatives on the next trip.
John Halpin, of Woodinville, had sent his mother, who died several years ago, on a number of trips with Kenney.
“My mother had an excellent time. Priscilla takes terrific care of her patients and documents every trip with photographs the clients keep,” he said.
Such personalized traveling doesn’t come cheap. Weeklong trips range from $6,500 to $8,000; the 14-day Mediterranean cruise starts at $15,000.
Norton credits Kenney for giving her a chance to fish again.
“I love fishing and didn’t think I’d ever do it again after my stroke,” Norton said. “But in Mexico another patient and I went fishing. We both caught two 25-pound tunas. Our hotel cooked them for our group for dinner that night.”
Sherry Grindeland: 206-515-5633 or %26#115;%26#103;%26#114;%26#105;%26#110;%26#100;%26#101;%26#108;%26#97;%26#110;%26#100;%26#64;%26#115;%26#101;%26#97;%26#116;%26#116;%26#108;%26#101;%26#116;%26#105;%26#109;%26#101;%26#115;%26#46;%26#99;%26#111;%26#109;
Tags: advent, decks, diapers, pool, poolside0
