When it comes to caring for your loved one, there are many options available for seniors that can help them in their day-to-day lives. Someone who knows all about providing a variety of care options to seniors is Barth Holohan. He is the president and founder of Continuum: Private Duty Home Care and is the co-founder of Family Partners: Day Services/Residential Home. He started his home care business in 2002, his day services business in 2008 and his residential home business in 2017. Barth has been in the healthcare industry for more than 20 years.
“I have a background in healthcare and social work and have always enjoyed being around seniors,” Barth said. “I saw the need for being able to help people be independent in their homes because most people don’t want to go to a retirement community, they want to be independent in the comfort of their own home.”
Barth’s businesses are located in the St. Louis area where there’s plenty of business, so Barth said he isn’t looking to expand to other cities right now, but could see his businesses expanding throughout Missouri in the future.
Barth said Continuum: Private Duty Home Care is made up of a care team that strives to help their clients remain safe, healthy and independent in the comfort of their homes, no matter what their care needs. Continuum Home Care’s Personal Care Services include: Meal Preparation, Light Housekeeping, Companionship, Bathing Assistance, Laundry and Linen Service, Shopping and Errands, Transportation and much more.
“The way Continuum differentiates itself is by being based on what we call a Care Management Model, where we use social workers and nurses to follow the care of people that want to stay independent in their home,” Barth said. “We provide all of the services that people need, which the government doesn’t pay for, in order for people to stay in their home.”
Barth said that most people don’t know that home care and services like his exist, so they feel like their loved one has to go into a higher level of care. “Accepting help from others can be a difficult decision, but if frailty requires accepting assistance where needed, it is actually the best way to remain independent at home. Family caregivers need to be able to ask others, like us, for help, in order to decrease stress, maintain their own health and to be able to provide the best possible care for their loved ones.” When looking for home care, Barth said that people should know that it can be a lot more affordable than living in a community and most people do better in their home.
Family Partners: Day Services/Residential Home is an assisted living community that provides an environment for those with dementia by providing stimulation to help individuals live as independent and long as possible.
According to Barth, he said the Family Partners Day Services is a Day Center for individuals with dementia who are still living at home and need a place to go during the day that provides them with the help and supervision that they need to be as independent as possible. “When caregivers work, the nice thing about our Day Center is that it provides daily and hourly supervision to seniors with dementia that you can’t get in a retirement community or at home. There’s just something special about seniors with dementia being around other seniors with dementia and having activities geared toward them that you can’t exactly get elsewhere.” The Day Services has many activities that keep seniors active mentally and socially, such as: field trips, discussion groups (books, films, current events, poetry), gardening, community service, movies, picnics, arts and crafts, mental stimulation games (board games, card games, Nintendo Wii, etc.) and much more. Barth said the Day Center will do anything they can to help families take care of their loved ones with dementia. “We’ll do anything from having dinner made and ready for them, so when they pick up their loved one, they can take dinner home with them. We will order all of their personal care and medical products, we bathe and dress them and just do anything that needs to be done in our adult Day Center, so families can interact with their loved one and not be such a caregiver when their loved one gets home.”
As for the Family Partners Residential Home, Barth said it is an eight-bedroom home in a residential neighborhood where people with dementia live when they can’t live at home any longer. It ensures a home-like person centered care.
“Some people don’t even know that a smaller assisted living community in a residential neighborhood is an option, so they always think that they have to go to the big bucks at a huge senior community, which is not always the case,” Barth said. “When looking for a good residential home for loved ones, people should know that there’s a lot of variety. For us, we offer a comfortable home-like setting at a reasonable cost and provide key socialization activities, outings, meals and daily living assistance for those suffering from memory loss. For caregivers, we offer services to lessen the burden of caregiving, such as senior drop-off and pick-up, dry cleaning drop-off and pick-up, concierge services and much more.”
You can learn more about these offerings at Continuum: Private Duty Home Care and Family Partners: Day Services/Residential Home.