2009 January « The Professional Geriatric Care Manager’s Blog

My Siblings

January 31, 2009 at 5:36 pm | Posted in Sophia Heftler, GCM | Leave a comment
Tags: Family, Help, Siblings, Support

As I was driving home from my Mother’s house today I was thinking about how lucky I am to have siblings who have mobilized and are willing to help me with the caregiving responsibilities during my Mother’s illness.

My sister and her partner came up from Florida and are staying with my Mother. They are helping with the day to day activities including cooking, laundry and ensuring my Mother is comfortable.

My brother who lives in the same town as my parents has made himself available to pick things up at the mini-mart in town, help my Father manage a property he owns and in general do anything I’ve asked him to do. He was a big help in getting our Mother home from the hospital on her day of discharge and is checking in on her frequently.

My role is to manage the nursing care, pick up and prepare medications for administration, talk to the doctors and oversee Mom’s condition and medical needs.

I am very fortunate. Many of my Clients cannot depend on their children to get along and work together to ensure the responsibilities of caregiving. I spend a great deal of time mediating family issues and trying to encourage siblings to give up their old roles and to work together.

Below you will find a link that will bring you to an excellent article to help you if you are feeling overwhelmed with your caregiver role and are beginning to feel resentment toward your siblings.

There are many difficulties encountered when caring for an aging parent, but if you and your siblings can work together the experience can provide you with memories you can treasure forever.

http://www.agingcare.com/Featured-Stories/133240/Getting-Your-Siblings-to-Help-With-Caregiving.htm

For the Coffee Drinkers Out There

January 29, 2009 at 2:34 pm | Posted in Mark Heftler, Admin | Leave a comment
Tags: Alzheimer's Disease, Coffee, Dementia, News, Prevention, Study

A 21 year study was just recently completed. During the course of the study, 1,409 middle aged men and women, along with the number of coffees they drank each day, were carefully tracked. At the end, it was discovered that those individuals who drank between 3 and 5 cups each day were 65% less likely to develop dementia when compared to those who drank 2 cups or less.It was also noted that drinking more than 5 cups each day was not significantly different enough from the 2 to 5 cup range, so it’s not simply an issue of more is better.

A few reasons for the results have been posited. In the past, coffee consumption has been linked to decreased risk for Type 2 diabetes, a disease which has been associated with increased risk for dementia. Coffee may also have an antioxidant effect in the bloodstream – this would reduce the risk for vascular forms of dementia. It’s also been discovered that caffeine has been shown to reduce the buildup of amyloid plaques in the brain during animal studies. Amyloid plaques are one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease.

So for all those coffee drinkers out there, don’t forget to keep drinking your brew each day!

Original Article

I’m Back

January 28, 2009 at 10:43 pm | Posted in Sophia Heftler, GCM | 2 Comments
Tags: Family, Life, Personal

Hi Everyone -

It’s been some time since I have last written. My life has been quite turned around lately. As you know I am the primary caregiver for my father who has early stage dementia. Last week I found out that my mother (and my best friend) has terminal lung and pancreatic cancer. She is gravely ill and there is nothing that can be done for her. It has been such a surreal experience as I have been working as her care manager for the past week, arranging to bring her home, for hospice care and all her medications. My sister who is retired came up from Florida and I would have to say that she is Mom’s primary caregiver, staying in the house and providing care for her. I go to see her everyday and am involved with the hospice folks, yet I don’t really feel like I am a part of this. I feel like I am a care manager. I am in a very strange place right now.

It’s funny but I have never thought of my parents as elderly because they are so active and involved in their local senior citizens club, but when we were in the hospital and the emergency room doctor was giving report on my Mom he referred to her as a frail, elderly 81 year old woman. It was only then that I realized that they are elderly and I will shortly be faced with my Mother’s death. It’s pretty scary being on this end of the equation.

As a geriatric care manager I work with families in my situation every day and work very hard to provide them with the best care imaginable. I am available to them 24 hours a day 7 days a week and handle any crisis that comes their way. I love being a geriatric care manager and assisting my families. I am toying with the idea of having one of the wonderful nurses I have working with me take over as Mom’s care manager so I can just be her daughter, yet I find myself unwilling to give up control. This has certainly opened my eyes to what my Client family members must feel when they make the initial call to me. This is an awful situation to be in but I feel like it will be an incredible learning experience for me and that I will be able to share what I learn with those who work for Distinctive Care. I am going to tell my Mother that this experience is going to make me a better person, a better care manager and a better boss.

I encourage you to comment on this entry. It’s very personal and I would love to know what you think about how I am handling this situation and also to provide me with any advice you may have to offer me. Or you can contact me directly at sophia@distinctivecare.net or through our website www.distinctivecare.net.

Sophia

New Alzheimer’s Support Group

January 26, 2009 at 8:06 pm | Posted in Pat Linard, PR | Leave a comment
Tags: Alzheimer's Disease, bergen county, Dementia, support group

If you have a family member who has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease or a related dementia disorder, an Alzheimer’s group is being offered where you can share your concerns in a supportive, caring and confidential environment. A new support group in Ramsey for families and caregivers is being offered through the trained facilitators at Distinctive Care Geriatric Care Management in conjunction with the Alzheimer’s Association of New Jersey. Come together with others to share your experiences in a community setting and obtain educational resources to help deal with the challenges of dementia. The group will meet the first Monday evening of each month at The First Presbyterian Church of Ramsey, 15 Shuart Lane, Ramsey, NJ. The first meeting will be held on Monday, February 2 at 7:00PM. For further information or to register, please contact Barbara Siembieda at Distinctive Care, 201-857-5283. If you can’t make the first meeting, you can always join in another meeting: March 2, April 6, May 4, and June 1.

Elder Gadgets at C.E.S.

January 19, 2009 at 1:21 pm | Posted in Mark Heftler, Admin | Leave a comment
Tags: Aging, Products, Technology

I love technology in all of its forms. Every year, a big trade show called the Consumer Electronics Show comes to Las Vegas, Nevada, and technophiles around the world spend hours on the internet glutting themselves on the wealth of new product information that’s released. Generally, nothing changes besides the products, of course. This year, however, something was different. There was a new showcase of products, called the Silvers Summit.

According to the official CES website, “The Silvers Summit showcases the products and services that keep boomers engaged, entertained, connected and healthy. Visit this destination to meet with distributors, journalists, research firms and manufacturers that will demonstrate the products and services that help mature consumers maintain a high quality of life.”

A large number new of products were showcased, many of them geared to assisting the elderly fulfill one of the goals we ourselves have set out for them – continuing to age safely within their homes. Because we live in a day and age where instant communication and constant updates are more than necessary, connectivity was a real issue covered by the products. One such instance of this was a system in which a number of single entities, such as a scale, pill box, and monitor would all be integrated to form one. The pill box would monitor when and what pills were being taken while monitors in the hall might spot falls, or the individual wandering out of the house, or using the bathroom excessively at night. Combined with the data from the scale, which would spot unhealthy changes in weight, the information would be compiled to see that a change in medication might affect a weight loss, or excessive bathroom use coupled with sleeplessness an indicator of some underlying problem.

Of course, this information being stored at home is not terribly useful. So the system is able to send out the data, or be checked remotely, by anybody with the proper authority. For example, the family caregiver, primary care physician and geriatric care manager may all be connected in and receiving timely updates on status changes. Detection and prevention systems like this will be immensely helpful in the coming years.

There are also problems with systems like this. There’s a good chance they’ll become treadmills to the elderly, purchased out of good intentions, yet gathering dust in reality. They will certainly be costly, and not covered by insurance. And for the physician in his office, it’s not quite so easy to diagnose something from a weight change or other anomaly. Cutting human interaction out of the equation will rarely be a good decision, but it might be a step in the right direction for safe in-home aging.

For more details on products and the summit, visit:

Silver Summit

NY Times

Message from Someone with Dementia

January 16, 2009 at 8:00 am | Posted in Sophia Heftler, GCM | Leave a comment
Tags: Alzheimer's Disease, Cognitive Ability, Dementia, Tips

Stay with me Today!
by Richard Taylor

I think there is too much emphasis on helping people with dementia hang on to yesterday (something caregivers need) vs. helping people living with dementia being, understanding, and appreciating today (something all human beings, especially people living with failing cognitive skills need). We need less memory books and videos, and more cues, memory aids and support to know and understand what is going on around us and within us today.

So what if we forget a 1,000 times a day? We still need to live in it. We still need to understand it and feel a sense of ownership of it. Otherwise, what is left for our minds to work on, to understand – yesterday? Twenty or fifty years ago?

It takes more time to enable and support us with our struggle to understand today. And it takes increasingly more time and effort to support our need and want to stay in today. Helping us hang onto yesterday requires less time. Make us a book of family photos, put a shadow box outside our room with things from our past in it, give us some old dolls or clothes to fondle or wear – then leave us alone, go about the rest of your day.

The emphasis on memories and yesterdays unintentionally tells our ever-confused hippocampus to focus on the past and pay less attention to today. Today seems to take care of itself as far as we are concerned. Other people make decisions for us, lay out our clothes, dress and wash us, take us to the bathroom, buy our groceries, cook for us, and keep calling us inquiring what they can do for us that we haven’t or can’t do for ourselves today. So why not spend some time relaxing and drifting out of today and listening to old tunes, watching old movies, talking about the past and let today take care of itself?

Regardless of how many plaques and tangles we each have in our respective brains we are all still what we think we are (Rene Descartes was right, sort of). Think about yesterday and guess who you are? When others around you treat you as if you were simply a carbon copy of yesterday or the past five or ten or twenty years, when others see us as evolving and growing old as they see themselves evolving and growing old, they are naturally inclined to see in us their own need to enjoy the past, but live in the present. They sometimes escape to the past to avoid the problems of today, but then they must return to today. There is no pressure on us to return to today, because there is less and less need for us to return.

Not so!

Spend more times thinking of creative ways to support and enable us to stay in today, to understand what is happening around and to us, to structure activities so we must make our own decisions – today!

“Make it so.” Please!

Richard Taylor

Geriatric Care Managers Meet to Improve Caregiving

January 15, 2009 at 8:00 am | Posted in Sophia Heftler, GCM | Leave a comment
Tags: NAPGCM, News, Support

(Source: National Association of Professional Geriatric Care Managers) – On Dec. 10, in Washington, D.C., leaders of the National Association of Professional Geriatric Care Managers and the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys met with senior governmental agency representatives and experts from health care advocacy organizations, providers of services and foundations to brainstorm ways to improve caregiving.

At the Thought Leaders Conference on Caregiving participants discussed ideas and strategies that could help shape public policy and respond to the increasing need for caregiving and the issues facing caregivers. From discussing the lack of long-term care financing to the bias in favor of the existing institutional model for caregiving, the experts identified what they felt were the key issues impacting the industry.

“As the senior population grows, so does the demand for caregiving,” said geriatric care manager Linda Aufderhaar. “We need to combine our resources to find new and innovative ways to provide these necessary services.”

Go to full story: newswise.com

Elderspeak

January 14, 2009 at 8:00 am | Posted in Sophia Heftler, GCM | Leave a comment
Tags: Alzheimer's Disease, Dementia, Research, Tips

As a Geriatric Care Manager the most important principles I uphold in caring for my Clients are Independence, Autonomy and Dignity. I truly believe in the importance of these principles in providing the best quality of life possible for those whose care is entrusted to my practice.

One of the most challenging aspects of communication with someone who has dementia is helping caregivers understand the significance of avoiding elderspeak. Elderspeak is a form of communication similar to baby talk. Elderspeak includes simplified grammar and vocabulary, substitution of collective pronouns and overly intimate endearments.

Research reported in the summer of 2008 by the Alzheimer’s Association suggested that elderspeak could make those living with Alzheimer’s Disease or other forms of dementia more resistant to care. Study participants were more likely to respond positively and to be cooperative when spoken to normally as adults.

It is important that family members and caregivers understand the impact their communications can have on their loved-ones quality of life.

This new research is proof positive of the importance of treating our older adults with dignity…one of the principles Distinctive Care Geriatric Care Management is founded on.

Memorial Service and The “Only Child”

January 13, 2009 at 8:00 am | Posted in Sophia Heftler, GCM | Leave a comment
Tags: Advocacy, Caregiver, Family, Only Child, Stress, Support, Tips

Just the other day I went to a memorial service for a Client of Distinctive Care Geriatric Care Management who had passed away. She was the mother of an only child and when I saw her adult daughter grieving it really made me think about the challenges faced by an only child caring for an elderly loved-one. Most people think about the ramifications of being an only child when they are young, but for most only children it is as they age and their parents become frail and elderly that the impact of being an only child becomes an issue.

Often the strong bond that only children share with their parents may mean that they take on the whole caregiving burden alone, often even though there are others around who are willing to help. There is a tendency to think they must sort everything out by themselves and want to give their parents the same 100% attention and dedication that they received from their parents growing up.

This often puts a strain on the only child as well on their relationships with others. Often times the only child feels torn between their own families and their jobs causing them to feel as though they are abandoning their own families and also to consider quitting their jobs to become a full-time caregiver.

Only children usually develop a strong network of friends – but need to be able to call on them during difficult times. The important thing for only children to remember is that they must let other family members and friends know what their needs are and when they need help. It is vital that only children allow themselves a break from caregiving to take time to enjoy the things they like to do.

Information and professional support are essential, though many people don’t realize how much help is available to them. Professional Geriatric Care Management is a service that can help only children cope with the challenges they face in caring for their parents. The Care Manager can assume so many of the aspects of caregiving, that the only child can get back to their own families, concentrate on their careers and get back to being the adult child of their parents.

For additional information on how Geriatric Care Management might be able to help you and your situation please contact us in our Ridgewood, NJ office at 201-857-5283. We are happy to speak with you and provide you with the information you require to “get your life back”.

Life History Review: I’m Excited About it!

January 12, 2009 at 8:00 am | Posted in Sophia Heftler, GCM | 1 Comment
Tags: Advocacy, Caregiver, Family, Life History Review

One of the new products Distinctive Care Geriatric Care Management has introduced this year is geriatric counseling for both our Clients and their families. The thing that really excites me about this new offering is that we will be providing traditional counseling as well as Life History Review.

I just read an article in the January 7, 2009 edition of the Bergen Record. Tom Meuser, who directs gerontology graduate studies at the University of Missouri is quoted as saying, “Many elderly are helped by a life review. Such a review asks the questions, How do I feel about the life I have lived? Have I done the best that I can? Will I leave with a meaningful legacy? Do I have unfinished business? Am I despairing?”

While all the answers to these questions will not be positive, when reviewed in the presence of an experienced counselor the outcome of the review can be positive. The counselor can help people who are in despair become more able to come to terms with their faults and grant themselves forgiveness. Meuser says, “Some people will die in despair because someone never asked them their story – in effect to review their lives.”

So it’s very exciting to me that Distinctive Care Geriatric Care Management is on the cutting edge of this counseling technique and have brought our counselor, Barbara on board. Most recently Barbara has attended a course on Ethical Wills presented by The Valley Hospital of Ridgewood, NJ to learn more about the techniques used in life history review and to review the importance of this often neglected way for older adults to help get their affairs in order.

In addition to helping the Client, Barbara’s documentation of the Life History Review makes an invaluable gift of themselves for their family members by providing them with a historic legacy.

If you are interested in finding out more about Life History Reveiw, please contact Barbara at Distinctive Care 201-857-5283 to explore the possibilities available to you and your loved one.