Throughout youth and middle age, few consider the vision of someday taking up residence in a nursing facility. When the issue painfully comes to reality, more often than not a relative needs the security that a nursing facility offers. We respond with a mingling of fear, simply because it could happen to anyone. Anxiety because the sound, smells, and sights of nursing homes can be upsetting. Sadness because our friend’s life seems somehow diminished by his/her new residence. Last but not least, guilty relief because we are thankful to be “on the outside.” Everyone’s sense of self, of personal integrity rests on a certain level of privacy. Normally implicit rights are already in jeopardy for peoples whose age or disability generates reliance on others. In case studies, the nursing facility appears only to aggravate the violation of personal privacy. For an example, the nursing home breaches the customary informational safeguard on one’s social status and past behavior.
