How You Can Support a Senior During a Short-Term Stay in Assisted Living

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Make a short-term stay in assisted living feel more like home with these tips.

After a surgical procedure or hospitalization, the physician may recommend rehab in a facility prior to when the person returns home. This is usually a short-term period of intensive therapy to promote healing and recovery. However, the idea of moving into an assisted living facility or nursing home even for a few weeks or months can be exceedingly hard to accept.

What are the best ways to help a family member through this challenging life event? There are a number of steps you can take to help overcome feelings of anxiety, fear, and homesickness during a short-term facility stay.

• Personalize the room. The facility will provide the bare necessities: a bed, chair, and dresser. Make the space feel more like home by bringing in items such as a favorite pillow and quilt, family photos, and other small memorabilia. Pack their favorite lotion, shampoo, and other personal care items, along with comfortable clothes. Be cautious, however, about bringing any items of special significance or value. This applies to clothing as well, which might get lost or delivered to the wrong person in the laundering process.

• Visit often. You may feel as though the person is receiving all the care they need, and that infrequent or short visits are fine. However, your companionship and presence are invaluable during this period. Pack a sandwich and join the person for lunch. Play games and cards together. Bring a book for the individual to read when you’re gone, and read the same book yourself, so you can discuss it together. Or simply sit with them and invite them to share whatever is on their heart.

• Be a motivator. Your family member will have a regimen of exercises and activities to focus on with their physical, speech, and/or occupational therapist. If the older adult and staff agree, attend therapy sessions along with the person. Find out what is involved in their recovery process, and exactly how you can effectively provide encouragement. For example, they may be encouraged to walk whenever possible. Taking walks together during your visits can provide the motivation they need to reach their goals.

You can also ask the doctor if in-home recovery is an option. If so, Generations at Home is here to assist every step of the way! We can begin by helping to prepare the home for the person’s discharge from the hospital. This can include grocery shopping so there are sufficient amounts of healthy food options available, picking up prescriptions, and performing a safety check to reduce fall risks. Once back at home, we can provide medication reminders, prepare meals, take care of light housekeeping, help with transfers and walking, and much more. Through it all, we’re here with friendly companionship to brighten the process of recovery at home.

Contact us at 727-940-3414 to find out more about how we are able to help with in-home post-hospitalization care services!

Technology for Older Adults that Makes Living at Home Easier and Safer

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senior lady and adult daughter looking at tablet“You are always free to choose what you do with your life. To make changes in your future, make new choices today.” – Brian Tracy

Selecting where to live in our older age is not straight forward. Nearly all seniors would rather remain at home for a lifetime, however it is not without concerns. Can it be safe? How about mobility issues or any other physical limitations? What happens if an older adult falls and cannot get up?

Fortunately, there are a wide variety of solutions that make aging in place feasible for seniors. Technology, for instance, is constantly evolving and developing, offering answers to the difficulties that may surface as we get older. Just look at some of these tech devices and how they are improving life at home for older adults!

Remote Patient Monitoring

Remote patient monitoring connects individuals with their physicians in innovative ways: wearable devices to trace vital signs, smart pill bottles with sensors, bio-ingestible capsules older adults can swallow, even electronic tattoos that can assess the progression of pneumonia. It’s a step above telehealth appointments, delivering more comprehensive data on a person’s medical condition than can be determined via a video chat.

Home Safety

Smart devices provide peace of mind to an older adult who lives alone – and to the family members who love them. Older adults can select from individual products that meet a particular need, for example, a smart door lock, doorbell, or fire alarm, or entire smart security packages for all of these features and much more.

Additionally, a smart speaker system such as Amazon Echo or Google Nest Audio operates by voice command, an essential feature to a home technology system. The senior can simply say what they need, for example, calling for help, and technology takes care of it.

Whole Home Automation

For people who want to jump into technology with both feet, a central control system will allow for a variety of functions to be executed at the touch of a tablet or smartphone, for example, lights, security cameras, sensors, window shades, thermostat, music, Wi-Fi, and so much more.

Michael Miller, author of My Smart Home for Seniors, sums up the many benefits of technology for seniors: “Technology helps all homeowners, but especially seniors, by automating things that are a pain or difficult to do.”

Of course, a human touch is always necessary for safe and independent living at home, in spite of how many tech tools we utilize! Reach out to Generations at Home at 727-940-3414 for customized in-home care support that will help seniors truly thrive.

Four Great Social Activities for Seniors

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Elderly women enjoying fun activities outsideIf you’ve ever watched kids at the playground, you know how effortlessly friendships are formed. A small group may be playing tag, and a newcomer dashes over with a breathless, “Can I play?” More often than not, the response is a resounding, “Sure!” and voila – instant friends.

If only it were that easy as adults! Friendships provide us with a wealth of benefits, and are especially important for seniors now following COVID-related isolation requirements. So how can you help the older adults you love boost socialization and make some new friends? Short of jumping into a pick-up game of tag, try these tips:

  • Join a club. Brainstorm topics of interest with your loved one: reading, knitting, gardening, fishing, sports. Then search online for groups in your area that meet to enjoy those activities together. The local senior center may be a great resource as well. If you can’t find an already-established group, consider starting one of your own!
  • Take a class. Community colleges often offer reduced-cost (or no-cost) classes for seniors. Browse through an online list of courses to find one or more that spark the senior’s curiosity and sign up. Don’t forget to check out physical fitness classes too! A variety of exercise programs geared specifically to older adults can be found at the local gym or YMCA.
  • Attend religious services. Many seniors stayed away from religious services during the pandemic. As it becomes safer to venture out, religious organizations are a great way to both build faith and friendships, often offering weekday programs and study groups in addition to worship services.
  • Get involved virtually. There are countless opportunities to meet others remotely – even more so since the pandemic caused us to think outside of the box. From online games to yoga to learning new languages, whatever the interest, there’s likely a virtual version available!

Once engaging in new activities such as these, it can still be challenging to know how to bridge the gap from an acquaintance to a friend. Help the senior remember that more than likely, everyone else in the room is feeling the same trepidation and self-consciousness to some degree. With those playground children in mind, encourage the senior to make the first move to start a friendly, welcoming conversation. Sometimes all it takes is one person brave enough to break the ice to kick off a lifelong friendship!

Our caregiving companions are great friends for seniors too! We carefully match each person with a caregiver who shares a similar personality type and interests, leading to a fast and strong bond between the two. Contact us online or call us at 727-940-3414 for a free in-home consultation to learn more!

The Keys to Happy & Healthy Aging

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It has taken nearly 80 years and a variety of research studies to produce the result: a good genetic makeup and wealth really have very little to do with our degree of joy. The Harvard Study of Adult Development launched in 1938, looking into the lives of high-profile participants such as Ben Bradlee and John F. Kennedy. Over the years, it has been expanded to add inner-city residents along with offspring from the original Harvard elite, and the outcomes were unexpected, to say the least.

It was established that the most effective predictors of a long and happy life were not genetics, IQ, finances, fame, or social class but quite simply close relationships. Robert Waldinger, director of the research study and a psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital as well as a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, shares, “The people who were the most satisfied in their relationships at age 50 were the healthiest at age 80. Loneliness kills. It’s as powerful as smoking or alcoholism.” 

Psychiatrist George Vaillant, who spearheaded the study from 1972 until 2004, shared in his book “Aging Well: Surprising Guideposts to a Happier Life from the Landmark Harvard Study of Adult Development,” the factors that forecast healthy aging:

  •     The absence of smoking and alcohol abuse
  •     Physical activity
  •     Mature mechanisms in place to manage difficulties in life
  •     Sustaining a healthy weight
  •     Having a stable marriage

In a nutshell, self-care is crucial for senior health – both mentally and physically – and devoting time and effort to making your relationships the best they can be most certainly falls under that umbrella as well. As a matter of fact, subsequent scientific studies have uncovered that the satisfaction level men and women experience in their relationships is an even better determinant of what their physical health is likely to be later in life than physical factors like cholesterol levels. 

The research also upended prior thinking that our personalities are set in stone by age 30. Many people who encountered difficulties in their early adult years enjoyed fulfilling later years, while others excelled early in life but ran into challenges in later years because of mental health issues and alcoholism. 

The research study is ongoing, looking into its third and fourth generations, as researchers believe there is still more to understand, such as how to better regulate stress and whether a hard childhood makes a difference in middle age and later years.

Let Generations at Home’s compassionate caregivers help instill joy in an older adult’s life; reach out to us today! Our caregivers serve as friendly companions to engage in exercise, conversations, and enjoyable activities together, cultivating socialization and additional relational connections. You can reach us 24/7 at 727-940-3414 to arrange a complimentary in-home consultation to learn more.

Six Ways to Boost Senior Health and Wellness

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Many individuals have left their New Year’s resolutions by the wayside by the end of January, but who says resolutions should only be made in the beginning of the year? There’s no time like the present to start a new goal or habit, particularly for seniors hoping to improve overall health. 

We have six tips you can implement today. Select one to begin, or jump right into all of them to attain the greatest benefit:

  1.     Make an appointment for a physical. As opposed to waiting for an injury or illness to contact the physician, a yearly check-up is a perfect way for older adults to stay on top of their own health and potentially prevent problems before they occur.
  2.     Get physical. With the doctor’s approval and recommendations at hand, kick off a new exercise routine – together! Working out with a senior you love allows you to motivate one another and function as accountability partners. Agree to sticking with it for a minimum of 21 days, after which it ought to be an ingrained, pleasurable habit you will wish to continue.
  3.     Stay connected. Help the older adult maintain friendships and contact with friends and family to ward off isolation and loneliness – something we have all become too familiar with throughout the pandemic. Offer transportation if needed for dinner dates, or with setting up technology to stay virtually connected.
  4.     Update vaccinations. Along with COVID-19 vaccines and boosters, flu, pneumonia, and shingles vaccines must be up to date. With age comes an elevated risk for severe effects from these illnesses, so vaccinations become much more important.
  5.     Don’t forget mental health. A mental health provider can help determine if anxiety, depression, or other concerns should be addressed, offering both therapeutic tools and medication if needed. Staying mentally sharp through brain enrichment activities can also help with the natural cognitive decline that occurs in aging.
  6.     Monitor what you eat. If the fridge and pantry are full of empty-calorie or fatty foods, replace them with proteins, whole grains, fresh vegetables and fruits, and low-fat dairy products. An extreme change in diet can be overwhelming and hard to stick to, so start simple with one replacement at first – carrot sticks instead of potato chips, for example – and work up to an overall healthier diet.

Generations at Home is here to help older adults in achieving these and any other goals with personalized in-home care and companionship. From transportation and accompaniment to medical appointments and fitness classes to grocery shopping and preparing healthy meals, all while giving socialization a much-needed boost, we’re empowering seniors to live their best lives every day. Email or call us to learn more about how we can help an older adult you love!

The Post-Pandemic Importance of Strength Training for Older Adults

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older disabled adult strength trainigAs we’re finally easing our way out of this pandemic, we’re finding out more information on how it has impacted the elderly – both physically and emotionally. We know older adults have been at a greater threat of serious side effects and death from the COVID-19 virus; however, the impact of 15 months of physical distancing and social isolation is likewise worrisome.

Dr. Jonathan Bean of the New England Geriatric Research, Education and Clinical Center in the Veterans Affairs Boston Healthcare System has observed a “significant decline in functioning” in both his senior patients and his own mother. While she had been able to walk using the assistance of a walker, be involved in conversations, and take part in other activities of daily life independently pre-pandemic, her self-care and cognitive abilities have diminished dramatically.

Physical therapy Linda Teodosio confirms, explaining, “Immobility and debility are outcomes to this horrific pandemic that people aren’t even talking about yet.” She is observing a substantial increase in both chronic disease exacerbation and falls – very likely because of poor lifestyle choices brought on by the pandemic, such as unhealthy food choices and less exercise.

As a result, increasingly more older adults are in need of physical therapy and other rehabilitative services. Several health plans are attending to the matter by following up with seniors to check on their wellbeing and also to help connect them to the services they require to regain their strength. Surprisingly, up to 20% of an older adult’s muscle tissue could be lost simply by not walking for as few as five days, according to physical therapist Sabaa Mundia.

Before leaping into a different exercise regimen, however, it is vital that seniors first schedule a consultation with the physician for a complete exam and recommendations on safe, ability-appropriate physical activity. Then make a plan to assist the seniors in your life to follow a healthier lifestyle which includes plenty of exercise.

Let Generations at Home assist the seniors that you know stay as physically active and engaged as possible to stay strong post-pandemic. Our professional caregivers are always readily available to provide the encouragement and motivation to help seniors make physical exercise a routine element of each day. We can also provide transportation and accompaniment to exercise classes, the gym, the pool – wherever and whenever an older adult wants to go. Sometimes, just adding in a daily walk with one of our friendly care providers can make a world of difference in how older adults feel!

Call us at 727-940-3414 for a complimentary in-home consultation to learn more about how we can help.

The One Phrase to Avoid When Caring for Elderly Parents

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daughter talking to elderly parentAs our parents age, it’s not necessarily simple to know exactly what our role as adult children must be. We’d like what is best for them, but if we’re not cautious, we’ll overstep our boundaries and find ourselves attempting to parent our parents.

This is also true when safety is a concern. There’s a thin line to walk between ensuring senior parents are safe, and supporting the independence they want and deserve. All things considered, it was not all that long ago when our parents were meeting not merely all their own needs, but ours as well. The change from care provider to care recipient can be frustrating and painful for seniors.

With this thought, there are a number of elements of independent life that a senior may now be lacking. And if we aren’t careful in how we approach these losses, it may lead to arguments, hurt feelings, and fractured relationships.

For example, one part of senior independence that’s often jeopardized is in others stepping in to take over tasks that could now be a little more challenging and take a bit longer for an aging adult to perform. Even though intentions are certainly good, it is actually bad for a senior’s self-worth and self-esteem. A much better approach would be to allow extra time, and to only offer assistance when truly necessary.

Yet one of the greatest indicators of freedom is the ability to drive, to go wherever and whenever we please. When driving is no longer safe for an older adult, it’s essential to approach the topic with tact and empathy. Neuropsychologist Dr. Sanam Hafeez explains that too often, adult children lose patience with their older parents, resulting in hurtful comments that may be truly traumatic.

He recommends avoiding phrases such as, “You’re not allowed to drive anymore!” It is much kinder and more effective to give elderly advice with choices, and to engage them in brainstorming a potential alternative. An example of this could be, “I’m sure it’s getting much harder to be able to see clearly now, which must make it challenging to drive. Let’s talk about some options that will allow you to go wherever you want safely.”

Together, then you can come up with an idea that’s agreeable to everyone. When it comes to choices, take into account that Generations at Home’s caregivers are available any time, day or night, to provide safe transportation and accompaniment for seniors. Our services are available in accordance with each senior’s wishes and timeframe, whether that involves a weekly lunch date with a friend, medical or salon appointments, attending religious services, or simply a Sunday afternoon drive to get out of the house and relish the scenery. Call us at 727-940-3414 for details.

How to Help Elderly Parents Maintain Dignity and Independence at Home

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portrait of senior manIt is simple to get caught up in the day-to-day caregiving tasks required to help elderly parents at home. There’s a great deal to be done, and often it’s just easier and more efficient to do it all on your own, letting the seniors relax. After all, our elders have taken care of everything for a lifetime; don’t they deserve a break?

The truth, however, is that retaining dignity and independence through our later years is particularly necessary to our wellbeing, something that originates from a desire for meaning and purpose in life. Even though ensuring safety is, of course, a primary concern, there are ways to help elderly parents feel empowered and still in control while in your care. For instance:

  • Work together on chores. While standing at the sink and scouring pots and pans might be unsafe or difficult for a senior loved one, perhaps she or he can sit at the table and dry them. The senior might not be in a position to bake a meal from start to finish but can mix ingredients while you reminisce about recipes made over the years. It could take a little consideration; nevertheless, it’s worthwhile to determine methods to alter tasks to incorporate the older adult’s assistance as much as possible.
  • Permit decision-making. Seek out opportunities to ask for the older adult’s wisdom, allowing her or him to remain in control. As opposed to assuming he or she will want a grilled cheese sandwich for lunch, ask. Before automatically accompanying a loved one to the doctor’s office for an exam, ask if she or he would like you there. Having a say in even the smallest of decisions can make a major difference in self-esteem.
  • Ensure safety with respect. Safety is, certainly, paramount, but there are ways to make sure a senior loved one stays safe without overstepping boundaries. Medical alert systems, for instance, are a great way to encourage independence in older adults while providing them with the means to call easily for help when needed.
  • Hire professional in-home caregivers. Some older adults resist the thought of their adult children helping them with personal care needs, such as using the toilet or taking a bath. A professional agency caregiver, who is trained and experienced in helping seniors maintain dignity while staying safe, is often a more agreeable solution.

Reach out to our aging care team at Generations at Home to learn more about our trusted home care services and other care tips on how to help elderly parents age at home, always provided with the respect and attention to the dignity older adults deserve. We are available for as little as a few hours each week up through and including 24/7 care. Call us at 727-940-3414 or fill out our online contact form to learn more about our home care in Indian Shores and other surrounding areas in Florida.