Most families engage senior care services when an elder in the family is struggling to manage at home, perhaps after several falls or other safety incidents at home. Sometimes a hospitalization or surgery precedes the engagement of home health care services. How do you know if it is time to consider home care services? Are there benefits to engaging elder care at home now? When does home health care most benefit a senior?
Here are some ideas about how home health care & senior home care might benefit someone you love today:
1. Home caregivers can add to quality, active senior living. Home care services can reduce isolation, help a senior follow up on a therapy/exercise routine, improve senior nutrition and prevent falls and other safety problems.
2. Establishing a relationship with a home health care agency allows you the time to be a true consumer of services, with choice and options for ensuring a good fit and services tailored to your needs. You can research companies that will do the best job for you and your loved one (read our Five Tips to Choosing Quality Home Health Care), interview and meet potential home care aides & companions, and consider getting a geriatric care assessment to help you determine needs, options, resources and create an affordable plan for you.
3. Your home care agency will typically be on call for you 24/7 and can therefore better assist you when additional services are needed or emergencies arise, often getting someone to the hospital to sit with you or adding additional shifts if you have trouble at night or need more help during an illness. When you call in a home health care agency for the first time for such needs, you are dealing with an unknown entity, which can add stress to a difficult situation.
4. Home caregivers trained in medication assistance can help with avoiding medication mistakes. A R.N. from a home health company can assist in filling a medication dispenser and a trained home health aide can provide reminders to the senior when it is time to take medications. This can be tremendously beneficial for anyone with multiple medications or complicated medication routines, especially someone who has dementia, cognitive impairment or memory loss. Medication errors can be very detrimental to the senior’s health.
5. Home caregivers can assist with household maintenance, errands and transportation…making life easier! A home caregiver can be a wonderful gift to someone you love…to help with the laundry, ironing, light housekeeping, grocery shopping, meal preparation and special projects. EasyLiving offers gift certificates so that you can provide the gift of home care!
Contact EasyLiving, Inc. TODAY to learn more about how we can help. During the months of May & June, as an added bonus in honor of Mother’s & Father’s Day, we’re offering ONE FREE HOUR OF CARE with at least 4 hours purchased.
You can reach us 24/7 at 727-448-0900!