7 Ways To Help Seniors Enjoy The Holidays

Ryan — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 20:37:22 +0000

How To Help Seniors Enjoy The Holidays

The holidays are here to remind us of what is most important in life, being with friends and family. For seniors is can be a highly stressful, confusing, depressing, and something they want to avoid if their mental and physical needs are not taken into account. So here are ways to help seniors enjoy the holidays.

1) Engage In Memories of the Past
Seniors may have difficulty keeping up with the speed of our normal conversation, and choose to listen more than speak. If there is memory loss involved it can make it even more difficult. Engaging in talk about past memories allow seniors to engage in stories they know well, when it may be difficult to recall recent events. This not only engages the older adult, but kids like hearing about their parents when they were young and full of energy around the streets of Boston. It keeps everyone engaged and smiling about the found memories everyone shares, and is one of the best ways to help seniors enjoy the holidays is talking about their past and letting them share stories that they have.

2) Plan Ahead
If a senior family member tires easily, or gets over stimulated by a large family talking, the noise, and chaotic nature of people cooking, drinking, and socializing at the same time, limit the amount of time that a senior is in that atmosphere. Have place where they can take a nap, or a room that is off to the side where they can have some quiet time. Have someone assigned to monitoring if they are OK, and if need be there to take them home early.

3) Keep It Simple
If the dinner is taking place in a familiar home. Keep the furniture that same, so they are comfortable with their surrounding, and recognize where they are. If it is being help at a new home for the person, eliminate obstacles that are not needed. Kids toys, slippery rugs, pet gates, and general clutter may not sound to hazardous to us, but to someone older it can be a slip and fall waiting to happen.

4) Avoid Embarrassing Moments
When a family member does not recall specific stories you are sharing about times on the Cape, or out on Nantucket, do not make it worse by asking ‘don’t you remember?’ As people age memories can fade, and when it happens pointing it out only makes it worse.

5) Create New Memories
Seniors do like going down memory lane, but they also need something to look forward too during the holidays. If possible, a simple drive around the neighborhood to look at which house has the best lights will do. Enjoying new memories with people is just as important as reminiscing about older ones

6) Include Them
Include everyone in the holidays. No one likes to see someone sitting alone all night long. Invite seniors into the kitchen to help out, even it is greasing baking pans, peeling vegetables, or folding napkins.

7) Reach Out
Sometime seniors can be forgotten in the other room, when one family moves from one room to another. Reach out and spend time with them so they feel included. No one wants to be left alone in a room because they have physical limitations that prevent them from moving. It took a lot for them to your home, be active in reaching out and making sure they are engaged.

Those are some of the ways to help seniors enjoy the holidays. Remember to always treat seniors with patience and understanding. Some can not react as quickly as we can so they decide to stay quiet and isolate themselves. This is when reaching out and including them is so important. If you can help seniors in your family enjoy the holidays, you will enjoy that much more yourself.

What Is Home Care?

Ryan — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 15:26:04 +0000

Explanation Of What Is Home Care?

Many people have heard of assisted living centers, and nursing homes, but when it comes to alternatives, many people may not have heard of in home care, and most ask, ‘what is home care?’ Home care in Boston is an alternative to going into a nursing home, or an assisted living center. The benefit to having home health care is that the client receiving care does not need to move all their belongings, clothing, and sentimental items into a small single person or shared room at a nursing and assisted living center. Unlike the alternatives, home care allows one-on-one interaction with the caregiver and client. Your loved one is always accompanied by someone, and has supervision throughout the day. While at nursing home or assisted living, they have dozens of people on staff that helps with your loved one, while with home care depending on the type of care, you may only have one person dedicated to your loved one. You also can visit your loved one in a comfortable place where you may have once lived. It allows both the client, and visitors to be even more comfortable, verses squeezing into a single room

Medical vs Non-Medical

There are two different types of in home caregivers, non-medical and medical. The obvious difference is that medical home caregivers help with medical needs. Injections, prescriptions, and IV’s and more fall under medical in home care. While non-medical helps with companionship, meal preparation, personal care, showering, transportation etc. Many people think that they must pick between the two, but this is not the case. A medical home caregiver will only help with the tasks that specifically deal with their field of medicine, and will only help with what the doctor has recommended. So non-medical and medical caregivers work best (when needed) together, the medical caregivers help with their field, and then non-medical help with what they do best.

Overview

Home caregivers can travel all over the Boston, and metro-west area. There really is no place that a home caregiver cannot go. If you live near your loved one that needs this service it can be very continent so you do not have to drive to a new location to see a family member. You can let the caregiver deal with getting to and from a client’s residence, and all you need to worry about is enjoying time with your loved one.