To take care of an elderly or your parents is your own choice whether you prefer assisted living, nursing home or in-home care. It depends upon you if you can take care of your parents or grandparents with ease or not. Here below you can find some tips to make a choice and decision to care your parents, grandparents or in laws. If you are choosing to provide in-home care for your loved ones, it might become tedious and stressful at times when helping them for their personal needs while taking care of their daily routine. The best solution to this will be to take some help through an agency to arrange a loving, caring, and reliable caregiver who can provide best service to your parents or grandparents.
Before you plan to hire a caregiver, you need to keep some important facts in your mind.
1.Make a list of your parents medical needs.
2. Calculate the cost of caregivers pay, their medicines, any special equipment like bed, wheelchair, urine pan, diapers or any special need they have.
3. Manage the finances to meet their requirements.
4. Providing safe environment for elderly like safety in bathroom, their own room, wheelchair arrangement, Walker, and a proper arrangement for communication devices like phone or monitor.
5. Organize their medicines.
6. Make sufficient arrangement for them to visit religious places and have a good social circle where they can spend some time with their friends or likeminded people. This will help them to manage their stress and anxiety caused by staying home all the time alone by themselves.
7. Spend at least 30 minutes to an hour with your parents every day.
If your elderly parents prefer staying home alone by themselves make sure the home is fully equipped and safe for an elderly to live alone.
(i) Remove all the clutter from their home to avoid accidents.
(ii) Bathroom has non-slippery mats and bars for support
(iii) check carbon monoxide detectors.
(iv) Check smoke detectors
(v) House has sufficient light arrangement to avoid accidents at nighttime.
(vi) Make sure your parents have phone and is charged always
(vii) You can hire a caregiver for companionship from an agency.
(viii) Check their home time to time to assure your parents live in safe environment.
(ix) Ask the caregiver to help them go out for walk if they cannot walk take them out in wheelchair.
(x) Every month make sure the pharmacist delivers their medicines on time
(xi) If your parents cannot drive ask the caregiver to take them out occasionally in the mall or religious places.
(xii) Tell your parents not to respond to any scam calls.
(xiii) If you have 2-3 siblings all of you can contribute every month to support your parents.
(xiv) Ask your parents to make their Will to avoid any clashes.
(xv) If you have any religious gatherings in the home you must involve your parents. That is the only source for them to enjoy the family and spend time with them.
These are certainly some small tips you can do to make the life of your parents happy and keep them free from all worldly worries, anxiety, and depression. You must remember one thing that your parents and grandparents with age are already going through transitional phase, old age mental depression, physical weakness, mood swings or physical ailments make them behave like a small child. If you can understand that everyone eventually goes through this phase, it will not make hard for you to care your elderly parents. This will keep them also calm, and free from worries and they will have a healthy and happy environment in the home.
