About Us

Family Caring For Family

What makes Merry Heart Senior Care Services so special is that in all of our programs and throughout all of our facilities the staff works together as a family. They are a concerned, caring team that ensures that the elder citizens entrusted to our care are given the help and encouragement needed to deal with their challenges. Our residents are given opportunities for accomplishment, joy and success. They are always treated with dignity and respect.

The History of Merry Heart

Merry Heart has been serving the geriatric health care needs of Morris County for over sixty years. Individualized health care is given in order to ensure dignity and a high quality of life to each resident. Merry Heart provides a continuum of care; many available programs that allow a more precisely tailored solution to specific care needs.

There’s also the opportunity to change programs if the need arises. All Merry Heart facilities are located in Morris County, New Jersey. Merry Heart was started in 1956 when a Succasunna couple, John and Hazel Kadimik, pursued their dreams of starting a senior care facility to serve the needs of their growing community. They were friends with two elderly ladies who owned a large Dutch Colonial home next to theirs. The ladies loved their home but found it increasingly hard to maintain.

They eventually made arrangements with the Kadimiks, that their lovely home become the Kadimik’s senior care facility. With this plan, the Kadimiks had a convenient location to start their elder care project and the two ladies could remain in their home without the headaches of caring for it. They were the first two of the eleven residents that began Merry Heart Nursing Home. It opened in October, 1956. Soon after that it grew from eleven beds to 27 with an addition to the back. Over the next few years, the owners found that the community’s senior care needs were growing quickly.

In 1963, a new state-of-the-art brick building was constructed behind the colonial house, facing Route 10. The new structure was later referred to as the Main Building. It accommodated an additional 34 residents. The original Merry Heart Nursing Home was then joined to the new building and referred to as the “Annex.” The opening of the Main Building marked the change from custodial to advanced clinical care at Merry Heart. After 34 years, in anticipation of their retirement, the Kadimiks decided to sell Merry Heart. They wanted the purchasers to carry on the tradition of community involvement and the “Family Caring for Family” philosophy of personal care giving that they had nurtured over the years. Their wish became reality when Blanche and Rudy Bonifacio assumed ownership in October 1992. The Bonifacios owned and operated Beverwyck Nursing Home, a 24-bed skilled nursing facility in Parsippany which they purchased in 1982. In 1993, the Bonifacios added two more licensed beds to the Main Building. Eventually fourteen of the beds there were converted to Medicare sub-acute (The sub-acute program enables a patient to leave the hospital earlier and get recuperative therapy and care at another facility).

As the community grew, the Bonifacios could see that it would benefit from additional geriatric care placement opportunities and programs. They set a goal of providing an upgraded, larger facility and a continuum of care that would enable more appropriate placements depending on need. After years of planning, purchasing adjacent properties and removing old structures, a modern skilled nursing facility came to life adjacent to the older buildings. The new facility, known as Merry Heart Health Care Center, now accommodates 113 residents and provides a variety of options on the continuum of care. It opened in December 2002. All beds in this facility are Medicare and Medicaid certified. In 2003, Beverwyck Nursing Home in Parsippany was renovated and converted to an 18-bed senior care center now called Beverwyck House of Merry Heart.

In 2004, the Main Building and Annex, the original structures of Merry Heart, were both demolished to make room for the Assisted Living facility.