New place for seniors to spend their time
LOWER POTTSGROVE » Senior citizens in the Pottstown area have a new place they can go to spend the day with others, participate in activities and maybe build some new friendships.
A Time to Remember Adult Day Center is a 6,100-square-foot facility at 1300 N. Charlotte St. at the North End Shopping Center in Lower Pottsgrove. The facility offers a place where adults age 60 and up can meet in a “safe and secure facility, so that they can have a great quality of life as they age,” according to owner and director Taquitha Phillips.
She said she wanted to open A Time to Remember to “serve our seniors,” adding it is important for seniors to be able to get out to meet with others.
“We don’t want them to feel as if there’s no one that cares,” she said, adding that socialization helps them avoid feelings of loneliness and depression.
“The pandemic showed us to love, to care, and to treasure the ones we have around us,” Phillips added.
A Time to Remember offers daily activities including knitting, board games, sewing, table games, reading, lounging and mingling. It serves three meals a day, as well as two snacks, and is open seven days a week from 5 a.m. to midnight.
In addition, a shower facility allows the center to offer bathing and mild grooming services for clients on request. The facility has LPNs and RNs on staff, and medicines can be administered to clients if they are needed.
It took Phillips about a year to get the center ready, and on Monday, Dec. 14, she opened the doors. Phillips had expected to open in September, but licensing, approvals and final build-out of the space took longer than expected due to the pandemic.
She is currently working to build her clientele and is getting the word out through word of mouth and by visiting medical practices — a task made a bit more difficult, she said, because many offices are still not welcoming visitors to their offices during the pandemic.
Phillips said that opening A Time to Remember Adult Day Center during the pandemic was a challenge. She began implementing her plans before COVID-19 was “even a thing,” she said. By the time the coronavirus pandemic was underway, Phillips was already well into development.
“I love what I do and the clients I have are really happy. I feel like it is hard sometimes, but I wouldn’t change it,” she said.
A Time To Remember Adult Day Center follows all CDC, state and local requirements for health and safety as the coronavirus pandemic continues.
Before they can attend the facility, clients must have a negative COVID test. Each day when they arrive, clients have their temperatures taken, Their temperatures are taken two more times throughout the day — before lunch and at about 3 p.m., according to Phillips.
When they arrive, clients are met outside the center by staff and brought inside once their temperature is taken. Daily drop-off and pick-up is outside, to minimize the number of people in the center.
Staff members are tested for COVID every two weeks according to Phillips, and employees also have their temperatures taken several times during the day.
“We also have a COVID room. If someone’s temperature is high during the day, they will be placed in the room away from the rest of the participants. They would then have to have someone come pick them up,” Phillips said, adding that a facility caretaker will be with the client while they wait for a family member, “so they are not alone.” That caretaker will then quarantine for 14 days, or until the client tests negative for COVID.
A Time to Remember is not Phillips’ first business focused on people in need. She worked in different home care agencies for more than 20 years before opening a home care agency in 2013 called Traveling Nurses LLC, located in Pottstown.
“My experience has always been in geriatrics,” she said.
Phillips moved to Pottstown when she was about 11, but recently moved to Delaware. She attended Allentown Business School, which later became Lehigh Valley College, getting a degree in business administration. She then attended Northampton Community College to study to be an EMT — which she said wasn’t the right fit for her.
“But, I wanted to be in health care. I worked for Bayada nurses first. I loved it there. I found my calling then. I loved hanging out and talking to seniors — hearing about their stories. That was fun for me,” she said.
Opening her first business “took a leap of faith to do it for myself,” she said, adding that she had no capital and worked the cases herself until she could afford to hire someone. Traveling Nurses LLC now employs 65, and supplies the nursing staff that will work at A Time to Remember Adult Day Center.
For more information about A Time to Remember Adult Day Center visit https://atimetorememberllc.net/, email ATimeToRemember1@gmail.com or call 610-323-1676.