My grandmother was in a very good assisted living facility last year, but she didn't participate in any of the activities, withdrew to her room to the point where people had to bring her meals to her, refused to get dressed or out of bed and called us with minor crises at least five times a week (and sometimes five times a day).

We felt it was better in that situation to try and bring her home, built a bedroom and handicapped-accessible bathroom for her and she lived here happily enough for about four months. She had a meltdown induced by not taking her meds no matter how much we wheedled, ended up in the hospital and is now in a rehab center, where she is obviously miserable. Her goal (and ours) is to bring her home when the psychoactive drugs (antidepressants and Aricept) have time to work. On the plus side, she seems more lucid already. On the minus side, she hates it there and must stay at least another two weeks.

When she comes home I'm assuming we'll have to get her in-home care of some sort, depending on how severe the symptoms are at that point.

I guess what I'm saying is, at least in my experience so far there has been no right answer. We're still working toward keeping her at home, but I'm wondering how possible that's going to be, for how long.