Senior Apartments Las Vegas

As millions of baby boomers reach retirement age and cost of health care in the United States soar, managers of Mexico nursing home waiting for more seniors to lead America South in the years to come.

the proximity of Mexico to the United States, the costs of labor and its warm climate make it attractive, although residents said the quality of care varies greatly from one industry which is just off it.

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After Jean Douglas turned 70, she realized she could not take care of herself more. Her knees were giving, and winters in Bandon, Ore., have been increasingly difficult to bear alone. Douglas was shocked by the high cost and impersonal care using living facilities near her home. After searching the Internet for other options, she joined a small growing number of Americans moving across the border to nursing homes in Mexico, where the sun shines and life is cheap.

For $ 1,300 per month - one quarter of what an average cost of nursing home in Oregon - Douglas gets a studio apartment, three meals per day, laundry and cleaning and care of 24 hours from an attentive staff, many of them speak English. She wakes up every morning next to a mountain lake sparkled, and the high average annual temperature is 79 degrees warmer. "It's paradise," said Douglas, 74. "If you need help living or survival is the place to be. I do not know that there is such a thing back (USA), and certainly not for this amount of money. "

Approximately 40,000 to 80,000 American retirees already live in Mexico, many of them in enclaves like San Miguel de Allende or the Chapala area, says David Warner, a professor at the University of Texas Public Affairs who has studied the phenomenon. There are no reliable data on the number living in nursing homes, but at least five sites are on Lake Chapala.

"You can barely afford to live in the U.S. anymore," said Harry Kislevitz, 78, of New York. A stroke victim, he moved into a convalescent home on the shore of the lake two years ago and credits the staff helped him recover his speech and his ability to walk. "Here you can see the birds, feel the air, and it is delicious," Kislevitz said. "You want to live."

Many expatriates are Americans or Europeans who retired here years ago and are now more and more fragile. Others are not quite ready for a nursing home but are exploring options such as home care services to health care, which can provide Mexican nurses at a fraction of the price States USA.

Retirement homes are relatively new in Mexico, where the elderly, aging usually live with their families. There is little government regulation. Some places have suddenly gone bankrupt, forcing American residents to move. Some Mexican homes asperities, such as peeling paint or frayed sofas, that would turn off many Americans.

"I do not think they are for everyone," said Thomas Kessler, whose mother suffers from manic depression and lives at a home in Ajijic. "But basically, they have kept our family finances fall off a cliff. "

Residents such as Richard Slater say they are happy in Mexico. Slater came to Lake Chapala four years ago and now lives in his own house in Casa de Ancianos, surrounded by purple bougainvillea and pomegranate trees.

It has plenty of room for his two dogs and a little patio that he shares with three other U.S. residents. He receives 24 hours of nursing care and three meals a day, cooked in a kitchen and served in a cozy dining room bathed in sunlight. His cottage has a living room, bedroom, kitchen, bathroom and dressing room.

For this Slater pays $ 550 per month, less than one tenth the rate of return home in Las Vegas. F.