Leslie Newlife

Concerns & Advice Part Two: Memory Care & The Circle of Life

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Welcome back to the Concerns & Advice series. Last week we featured a blog on a member of the New LifeStyles family, who is dealing with the effect of dementia and Alzheimers on their parents. In this weeks post we are featuring advice to help others who may be in the same situation.

After your loved one receives a diagnosis of a dementia related illness, especially a progressive one, your mind fills with questions. What do we do now? How do we prepare for an uncertain future? Will I be capable of caring for my loved one’s needs as the illness progresses? Ideally, we would like to keep our loved one at home as long as possible. But, how should we decide when it is the proper time to move them into a memory care community?

Here are three criteria to consider when deciding if and when this move is necessary for your loved one.

Daily Self-Care

If your loved one is still capable of completing daily self-care, then remaining at home could be a better temporary option. If a little help is necessary for daily self-care tasks, your loved one may not want to ask you to assist them. So it may be in your best interest to bring in a home care aide a few hours each day, or a few days a week to assist with these tasks. In all your loved one may feel more comfortable allowing a home care aide to assist rather than a family member. If the daily care becomes so difficult that you feel overwhelmed on a regular basis even with the help of a professional caregiver, it is probably time to consider moving them into a memory care unit where full-time specialized care is available.

Disorientation and Wandering

There is nothing as frightening as having a loved one with memory issues slip, out for a “walk” only to be found days later suffering from exposure or worse. If you are capable of having someone with your loved one round-the-clock to monitor their movements, then staying at home is still possible. But if wandering and disorientation continues to occur frequently, it may be time to reconsider living at home.

Personal Safety

The same caution goes for the use of major appliances like the stove, or the car. One woman took her father’s car key off of his key ring and replaced it with a key that while similar, didn’t start his car. When her father went out to try to start the car the key wouldn’t work. He would sit in frustration for a moment and then go back into the house. Another strategy is to unhook the battery of the car if it is a car you do not use regularly. However, with all of these strategies and tips on how to keep your loved one safe; sometimes a devastating fire or car accident may still occur regardless of the precautions taken. At that time, it may be best to pursue memory care.

Although we may feel that are loved ones are happier at home, being at home may not be the best option if their safety is at bay. Memory care units are well equipped as a safe secure place for your loved one to live with dignity while the illness progresses, and should be considered as a viable option. If you would like to find memory care options in your area click here for more information.

Hospice Care Benefits for Your Loved One

If your doctor or caregiver has recently recommended for your loved one to be put on hospice care, you are probably wondering how your loved one can benefit from it. Often, hospice care can have a negative stigma, but in actuality can be a comfortable and peaceful service for seniors living in there last days. Here are a few benefits your loved one will gain when in hospice care.

Familiar Environment

One benefit of hospice care is that your loved one will be in a familiar environment. Your loved one won’t be stuck in an uncomfortable hospital bed, surrounded by people they don’t know. Instead they can choose to be at home, in their own bed, surrounded by friends and loved ones, receiving the same care as they would in a hospital.

Personalized Care & Support

Another benefit of hospice care is that your loved one will receive personalized care and support. Because doctors and nurses are working with a patient one-on-one the care and support they receive will be personalized to them specifically. In addition to this families members of the patient can also receive counseling, grieving and support services as well.

Respectful Care

One last benefit of hospice care is the fact that, your loved ones wishes are respected. Health care professionals will do their best to make sure that your loved one is comfortable. It also gives patients time to discuss their final affairs and spend precious last days with their loved ones.

In all, there are several reasons why hospice care can be beneficial. Respectful care, personalized care and support, and a familiar environment are just a few things that can make hospice care so worth it. If you would like more information about hospice care and the agencies in your area click here.

Plan Labor Day Fun for Your Senior Living Community

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Even though many of the people in your senior living community have probably had many years pass since their last working days, they probably still feel a strong connection to the industries they spent years serving and the titles and responsibilities they used to have. For some seniors, working represents usefulness and it can be difficult for them not to be known as the worker they once were.

Labor day is the perfect day to recognize the members of your community and the work that they did in their younger years.

According to the United States Department of Labor, “Labor Day, the first Monday in September, is a creation of the labor movement and is dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers. It constitutes a yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country.”

This year Labor Day will be celebrated on Monday, September 7th. With it only being a few weeks away you and your community can brainstorm now to find ways to make seniors feel special.
Ask Questions
In preparation for Labor Day, ask your residents about the jobs they held throughout their lives. Ask about their first jobs, their best jobs and their worst jobs.  Not only can this help your community come up with ideas to make for a great labor day celebration; But it can also spark a seniors memory and make for good conversation.
Decorate!
Find fun ways to display the information you gather around your living community. Make bulletin boards that shows all of your residents and the industry they worked in. Make gift baskets or have themed meals geared toward their particular industry.
Entertain
Have an event where you interview some of your residents about the jobs they held. You can even let it be a forum style discussion where other residents can chime in on their experiences. Your residents might really enjoy spending time with other people in their community who held similar jobs.
In all, Labor Day is an important day to celebrate the contributions and achievements made by men and women in the workforce. Make this day another opportunity to celebrate the accomplishments of the seniors in your community.

Nursing Home Marketing Tips

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The CDC has reported that, as of 2012, there were about 1,383,700 senior citizens living in 15,700 nursing homes across the nation. The number of senior citizens in the country is expected to double from 2010 to 2050, and the number of citizens over the age of 85 will be nearly triple in the years from 2015 to 2050. This means that the need for nursing homes is going to increase. It also means that competition among nursing homes is likely to increase. According to an article published in the Houston Chronicle, there are a number of marketing tools that nursing homes should be aware of differentiation.

 

Nursing homes should examine and communicate to the public their target market and what sets them apart from other nursing homes in the region. What is your unique selling point?
Provide facts and figures
How is your facility better than others? With technology, families have access to the information about more options than ever before. They don’t want to just take your word for it that your nursing home is better, they want to see numbers. One size fits all doesn’t necessarily integrate with the provision of quality care. If your facility excels at something — whether it’s memory care, care of mentally disabled seniors, or another niche — market that.
Involvement
Potential clients and their families want to know more about you than simply the care you provide. They also want to know about your involvement in the community and your commitment to working with legislators to improve the quality of care and rights of seniors.
Don’t make promises you can’t keep
Only market the services that you know you’re able to provide, regardless of any unforeseen circumstances.
Are you using any of these tips to grow your nursing community and services? Tell us about some of your experiences and ways you stand out from other homes in your area. Check back here weekly for more information about marketing your senior services and other industry news.

Senior care and the need for a private-pay, or hospital advocate

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Senior care, particularly for a loved one in the hospital, can be times of high stress on many fronts. Most often, the hospital stay can begin fairly smoothly. You’re happy with the staff, and are even more at ease because you were able to catch the doctor on his rounds to the latest updates. But then you realize that maybe the nursing staff didn’t get the updates you’re doctor told you. As your frustration ramps up, you realize it’s time talk to someone you can rely on for getting the right answers. As such, your options include a couple of ways to proceed to find a representative who can be an advocate for you and your loved one.
 
Should you use the hospital’s ‘Patient Advocate’?
 
It might not seem like the best way to go, after all you’re looking for a quasi-independent representative…not someone on the hospital’s payroll. Generally though, these staffers are trained and members of the American Hospital Association.
 
Using a ‘private-pay’ advocate.
 
This choice will cost you for the service, but you’re likely to receive someone with a lot of experience in areas like:
 
* Medical Assistance: familiar with diagnosis and treatment options
 
* Insurance Assistance: knows the ins-and-outs of the paper chase with insurance companies; there to fight claim issues.
 
* Elder/Geriatric Assistance: a lot of expertise in Medicare and hospice services.
 
* Legal help: provides oversight on medical errors that may be occurring.

 

Overall, the paid advocate can be a welcomed ‘third party’ to not only provide patient advocacy, but help track all the medical bills.

 
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Nursing home(s) for short term stays possibly avoidable if a ‘Swing Bed’ is available at your hospital

You’ve just logged three, consecutive days of acute care in your hometown, rural hospital. Fortunately, ‘Medicare Part A’, will be picking up a good portion of that huge medical bill

Still, you’re thinking about the next step: perhaps a short recoup time in a Skilled Nursing Facility(SNF). The difficulty for you is that the only nursing home(s) is over a hundred miles from your home.

But, then, you hear the hospital’s discharge planner say the ‘swing bed’ word, and you liked the part about not having to travel up river to the nursing home.

HOW DOES IT WORK?

Some of the requirements your rural hospital must meet are outlined by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and include:

—(location) in a rural area, which includes all areas that are not delineated as urbanized by the U.S. Census Bureau based on the most recent census for which data is published (an urbanized area does not include an urban cluster);

—Have fewer than 100 beds (excluding beds for newborns and intensive care-type units);

By law, certain rural hospitals have ‘swing bed’ arrangements through Medicare Part A and the CMS.

After the hospital assesses your healthcare needs, you’ll be told if you can use one of the hospital’s swing beds. In effect, you’d be moving from an acute level of care to skilled rehabilitation. All this without leaving your current hometown hospital.

I’M IN A CITY HOSPITAL. CAN I GET A SWING BED AT MY RURAL HOSPITAL?

An SNF patient doesn’t really have to be from the same hospital—or Critical Access Hospital— for a swing bed assignment in your hometown, rural hospital. The hospital is required to make that available. Your hospital’s discharge planner can help you plan that next step.