Caregiving Articles with Tips and Recommendations

In this excerpt of the new book It’s Between You and Me, author Ali Davidson helps the generations take the first step toward understanding and accepting the changes that occur as we get older.

You and your family have decided that it is time to bring in outside help to assist with the care of a loved one in need. Because you want them to be able to remain safe, comfortable and independent in their own home for as long as possible, you have chosen to hire an in-home caregiver or home healthcare agency.

It can be difficult to acknowledge the fact that your parent needs some help with day-to-day activities, let alone introducing to them the idea of hiring a professional caregiver for help. Your parent is likely to react to this decision with some resistance.

While there is some small comfort in knowing that the pressures you feel are shared by many others, the bottom line to this very personal matter is simple: finding the time and services that can help make your life and the lives of your aging parents a little easier. This year, as you provide elder caregiving for a loved one who is either living with you or still in their own home, find the balance you need each day to continue to be a great caregiver for your loved one and yourself while avoiding caregiver burnout.

Caretaking is fraught with many myths, assumptions and beliefs that have prevented generations of caregivers from understanding that caregiving is a rite of passage. Rites of passage define a sense of self in relation to society, paving the way for life transitions and allowing a more meaningful and clear incorporation of both familial and public roles. Seeing a family member through a health crisis marks the beginning of yet another transition for both the caretaker and the receiver and helps to define new roles and responsibilities in each of their lives. Although caretaking can help younger caregivers understand their place in the world, most view it with dread: an emotional roller coaster in which a plethora of daunting practical issues must also be addressed. These issues include the needs of spouses and children, estate and legal matters, health insurance, medications, funeral arrangements, and, in many cases, conflicts with siblings about how best to care for Mom or Dad and how to apportion responsibility, financial and personal, for their care.

Learn how to first come to terms with the idea of role reversal, as you become the parents to your parents.

Green Houses and the Eden Alternative are elder housing approaches developed by Dr. William Thomas in the early 1990s. They are an innovative and bold step toward the radical overhaul of the system of housing and nursing care for the elderly. The Eden Alternative nursing homes and Green House project offer elders a warm, homey environment that minimizes the sterile, institutional atmosphere of most traditional nursing homes.

The National Association of Area Agencies on Aging reports, "of the almost 6 million adults age 65 and over with long-term care needs, only 20% receive care services in a nursing home or other institutional setting, with the remaining 80% receiving assistance at home and in the community." So how do you know when it’s time to make that move from home care to an nursing facility?

The mechanics of elder mediation are not much different than other types of mediation, except that both “sides” in these disputes are members of the same family. Parentgiving.com got an inside perspective from elder mediator William Van Twisk of Brunswick, Maine.

As baby boomers approach their own retirement age, very few thought they would become caregivers to parents well into their 80s and 90s. Their parents probably never wanted this for them to either; they’d much rather remain independent. Disputes can arise from these situations.

In a study conducted by George Washington University Medical Center in Washington, D.C., researchers found that nationally visits to emergency rooms by the elderly have increased more than 34% in the last decade.  Although it is unclear exactly why visits by the elderly have increased, the study surmises that the increase may be due to “older people surviving with chronic medical issues, as well as problems the elderly are experiencing accessing primary care doctors.”

For patients who have suffered an injury, illness or exacerbation of a disease, subacute nursing home care can offer a money-saving alternative to in-hospital care. Subacute care differs from that of a traditional nursing facility in that it provides more intensive care to the patient until the condition is stabilized.