Tagged with senior_care …

Caregiving – Coordinating the Stakeholders

As a parent ages, the range of people who offer support expands dramatically. The older the person the larger the group can be, with multiple doctors, caregivers, assisted living staff, family members, friends, and therapists. A broad range of supporters is a plus, but a designated coordinator, someone in possession of the big picture, is … Continue reading →

Geriatrician Crisis in the U.S.

Found this interesting article about the need for geriatrician. Here’s the intro. “Think about it… If the number of students doubled and the number of teachers didn’t, that would be a problem, right? Well, a parallel to this scenario is actually taking place in the health care world: our elderly population will double by 2030 … Continue reading →

Quality of Care Leader May Head Medicare

According to the New York Times, President Obama will be appointing an experienced and collaborative physician as the new administrator of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). The article by Robert Pear, Obama Chooses Health Policy Scholar as the Director for Medicare and Medicaid, reported that Donald M. Berwick, M.D. is to be … Continue reading →

Aging Parents: Touch Screen Technology Innovations

Aging parent supporters and caregivers know how gratifying it is to sit with an elderly parent looking through old photograph albums. While we all love to do this, uncomfortable moments can arise when parents with dementia experience anxiety when they cannot remember an event. Now comes interesting dementia research reported in the March 25, 2010 … Continue reading →

Aging Parents: Medicare Doughnut (Donut) Hole Changes

Check out the March 24, 2010, NY Times for Tara Parker-Pope’s post, How Different Types of People Will Be Affected by the Health Care Overhaul, which also incorporates an amazing interactive graphic enabling people to see what changes will occur to groups of people who fit into various categories — fully insured and employed couple, disabled individual, couples or … Continue reading →

NIH Senior Net – A Senior Friendly Site

…and Tips for Making a Website Senior Friendly Take a few minutes to visit this NIH Senior Health site. Bring an aging parent along. Notice the great care that has been taken to make the site easy-to-read with large type and navigation links that are clear and uncluttered. This site is full of information on … Continue reading →

NPR Story on Vaccines and Aging

This morning (February 8,2010) on National Public Radio, a Morning Edition story, “Adapting Vaccines to our Aging Immune Systems.” explained how vaccines given to seniors are not as effective compared to those administered to children and younger adults. The story describes how the body’s immune system works in general, and how a senior immune system … Continue reading →

Helplessness and Aging

Watching all four, now only two of our senior parents over the past ten years, I’ve been intrigued that a certain amount of helplessness seems to surface when they encounter the medical system. When a person becomes ill or develops a chronic condition, the medical world usually goes into high gear. This is especially true … Continue reading →

Caregivers: Looking Back, Giving Back

We were fortunate to have people and places who helped us care for my husband’s mother. During the last year of mother’s life, things were intense, and sometimes we wished that we could be taken care of, too. Choosing to help with mother’s care and to have her near us, especially before she needed substantial … Continue reading →

Dementia: Losing the Ability to Move?

Mother can no longer move on her own, though she can still shuffle when we hold on to her. If she tries too get up on her own early in the morning or when we are momentarily glancing away, she falls. Her shuffles continue to grow tinier, and her balance is non-existent. It looks like … Continue reading →

Dementia: Caregivers

Committed caregivers make the dementia experience tolerable, and tolerable is about the best we can feel as we live through this terrible disease. My husband and I are caregivers to his mother, but we also have strong, warm, and compassionate caregivers who spend much of the day with her. These women are making our experience … Continue reading →

Dementia: Mobility, Falling, and Perception

This morning mother fell. Until now she has stayed in bed until one of the nursing assistants arrives to help her get up and get dressed. Today it was a different story — for the first time she tried to get out of bed. The nursing assistant found mother on the floor in the living room a bit … Continue reading →

Dementia: Life in Reverse

Mother’s dementia is progressing. I’ve mentioned in other posts, that she needs a caregiver all of the time, except when she is sleeping (she sleeps soundly). She is almost always confused, asking many times a day, “What should I do?” I find myself searching the web for confirmation of what I see each day. Today … Continue reading →

Parent Legacies

I’ve been thinking a lot about legacies — those intangible gifts that my parents are handing down to me. As I watch my parents get older, and when big and  small health issues occur, I wonder what my life will be like without them. I don’t worry about helping them in these next few years, … Continue reading →

Oxygen II

Mother was right. We did not know how to correctly put the oxygen tube nose piece on her head. She was agitated for a reason last night and was probably uncomfortable. Today when we went over to visit, Dolma, her caretaker showed us how to operate the oxygen. Dolma helped Mother put it on and … Continue reading →