Support For Home - Issues in the Aging Experience

Getting Better Takes Commitment

The title of this post can mean a lot of things. If we are ill, we have to commit to getting better, being compliant with medications and clinicians guidance, making the effort. If we are golfers, it means beating balls, intelligently, with discipline, not just going to the course and hoping to play well. For businesses, like Support For Home(r) In-Home Care, it means learning where we are strong…

More Dangerous in or out of Hospital?

Last year, Forbes published an article that those of us in elder care and home care already understood very well. The article, by Robert J. Szczerba (@RJSzczerba), talks about the fact that coming home from the hospital can be a lot more dangerous than many folks realize. Without trying to be facetious or disrespectful of the work done in hospitals, we know that is already a dangerous place to…

In the interests of full disclosure, I will admit that my wife, the co-owner of Support For Home In-Home Care, is ethnically Chinese and was born in Singapore. So, when something of interest happens there, she will either pass it along or I will notice it and take a look.

The latest of those items is a Huffington Post articleby Paul H. Irving, Chairman, Milken Institute Center for the Future of…

NAIPC Recommendations – Aging in Place

In my last post, I talked about the National Aging in Place Council annual meeting and some of the findings presented there, including some excellent work from the folks at Georgia Tech.

There are a number of “possible solutions” – or, in some cases, the lack of solutions – also presented, in a variety of areas, including:

Personal Finance. This is a very big deal for seniors and those folks…

Challenge: Aging Population + Longevity

The National Aging in Place Council, at its 2015 Annual Meeting, spent a lot of time on a number of issues that our society, as a whole, and elders in particular are facing. The meeting report is well worth reading, and I am sure if you contact them you can get a copy.

The thrust of the meeting is summarized in the meeting report’s subtitle, “Replacing ‘Denial’ with ‘Planning a Better Later…

How Do YOU Feel About Aging?

The Wall Street Journal has a very good article on aging, titled, “To Age Well, Change How You Feel About Aging“. While some of it is, okay, just common sense, a good portion is really thought stimulating.

We all understand the importance of attitude in our lives. This article reinforces that:

In test after test, researchers are finding that if we think about getting older in terms of decline or…

Good Ideas on a Tough Topic for Seniors

Joan Medeiros is an elder law attorney in Sacramento to whom I have given credit in the past for some very good ideas. Here, I want to give her credit for two reasons. The first is the topic – older drivers. The second reason is some solid ideas for families – and elders – on that topic.

Below, I have pasted her latest email. Since she does not have a blog site that I know of, I cannot just…

Nurses Take Step Forward!

An article at HealthITAnalytics.com takes a big step in the right direction, concerning making Electronic Health Records (EHR) more valuable in the provision of health care. The American Academy of Nursing issued a policy statement that EHR “are incomplete and potentially insufficient for use in population health management programs when they are missing social and behavioral data…”

Thought…

Drop the Cynicism, Deal with Data!

I know that sometimes my writing can come across as just a bit opinionated and blunt. :-) Guilty as charged. However, I try to make sure my writing is based on data, knowledge and research – doing my homework.

I have read a number of articles at myseniorportal.com that I fully support, but I just read one that has me shaking my head and feeling a bit frustrated. The article, “A Move to Assisted…

Yes! Planning is Good!

An article in NowItCounts.com absolutely nails it! I have been poking and prodding and nagging at folks, in this blog and elsewhere, to take planning for the aging experience much more seriously than most people do. Well, along comes this article, from a fellow named Buck Wargo, titled, “What Do You Want To Be When You Grow Up? Retirement As Life 2.0“.

Aging is much more than retirement, but if…

Daughters and Sons as #Caregivers

An interesting – but not surprising – article in AgingCare.com starts with the headline, “Daughters Care Twice as Much for Their Parents, Compared to Sons“. I am sure that title did not refer to emotional attachment, but to the level and amount of care provided to aging parents by sons and daughters. In our experience at Support for Home In-Home Care – and in my own personal experience – that is…

It Just Keeps Getting Better

I have written several posts recently about our experience applying the Music & Memory program to our home care services at Support For Home In-Home Care. I continue to smile and appreciate what our Home Care Aides are doing with our clients, and it just keeps getting better.

Today one of our Home Care Aides gave us another report concerning a client with dementia we have been using Music &…

More Music, More Memory

A few days ago I posted an article on why Support For Home In-Home Care became certified in the Music & Memory program. We have been rolling it out to a number of our home care clients and continue to be delighted by the results. This past weekend we got two emails from one of our Home Care Aides who is working with a client suffering from both Alzheimer’s and mental illness – a tough combination…

I wrote a bit ago about the fact that Support For Home In-Home Care is certified by the Music & Memory organization – and we are delighted by that. The program was designed for use in facilities, and it is rather more complex to implement and administer in multiple home care settings, which is one reason we are among only a few home care agencies to be certified.

However, the benefits of Music &…

Dementia Todayis a pretty darn good blog side for folks in our industry – and for families – to check out now and then. In a recent posting, they talk about some research out of the Mayo Clinic, involving issues of guilt felt by caregivers caring for folks with dementia. The gist of the research is that such caregivers are carrying around a whole lot of guilt that they should not feel. Of course,…

Affordable Care Act and Home Care

Each year, Support For Home In-Home Care participates in the Private Duty Benchmarking Study, conducted by Home Care Pulse. These studies cover a wide range of topics and are quite valuable to home care agencies – and to the clients they serve.

Among the topics covered in the 2015 study is the impact of the Affordable Care Act on home care. That impact is not just on the agencies, themselves, but…

Yesterday I wrote about an article in USA Today about the incredible financial cost of healthcare for our country’s medically complex elders. As I mentioned, that cost is not just to our clinical healthcare system, including Medicare. It also hits the families and the family caregivers very hard, as well.

The chart below shows the impact of the medically complex elder. It is one thing if I am 45…