Bill Thomas cont'd

Dr. Thomas with Producer Dale Bell

Let me say this, the baby boomer generation is coming. And the irresistible force of the baby boomers is about to collide with the unmovable object of the nursing home. And there's going to be explosive change that comes from this collision. The boomers will not leave one stone upon another. They will completely wipe out the nursing home we remember from the 20th century.

What will be in its place? Well, best way I think of understanding this is, when the baby boomers were kids there were three flavors of ice cream, and that was it. And when they got done with ice cream, there's a thousand flavors of ice cream. Well, right now there's just a few flavors of long-term care for the elderly. When they get done, there will be a thousand flavors. And that's the way it should be.

How long is it going to take for this kind of thing to happen?

Well, you know what, a nice way of thinking about what's going to happen to long-term care ... look at child birth. Look at what the boomers did to child birth. When they came along, cigar-chomping obstetricians used to strap women down with leather restraints and pull the baby out. When the boomers got done with 'em, 15 years, 20 years, family birthing centers, jacuzzis, lactation consultants ... Poof! The whole thing was different. So I actually foresee a revolution that's going to be ramping up in the next 2, 3 years and then over the next 10 to 15 years will radically change the approach to elder care in America.

You say that you have co-founded this Eden Alternative thing. What is the Eden Alternative? Why do we even need to know about it?

Well, in the early 1990's I took a job, I'm a physician, I took a job working at a nursing home, and I took that job because I thought that it would be a break from my real work as a ER doctor. And I fell in love with the work. And I fell in love with the people. And I came to detest the environment in which that care was being provided.

The nursing home takes good, good, loving, caring people and plugs them into an institutional factory-like arrangement. And it's no good. So what I want is an alternative to the nursing home, an alternative to the institution. And the best alternative I can think of is a garden. I believe that every elder should have a chance to live in a garden. I believe that, when we make a place that's worthy of our elders, we make a place that enriches all of our lives, caregiver, family member and elder alike. So the answer the Eden Alternative provides is a reinterpretation of the environment elders live in, from an institution to a garden. That's why we call it the Eden Alternative.

Next: The Eden Alternative's main components