Why care for the caregiver in the home?
For many, our journey in life includes many roles. We go to college to prepare us for our future career in life. These roles have somewhat gave us an idea on what we want to become but none have prepared us for the role as a caregiver.
Kathryn summed it up best after two years of caring for her 60-year old, once vital husband who had suffered a massive stroke. Taking him from hospital to outpatient rehabilitation to a necessary, more intensive live-in rehabilitation center, she had to spare some energy for fighting with his insurer to pay for his ongoing medical, rehabilitative, in in-home care. “It is staggering how ill-prepared we are for these types of situation, ” she said. The last two years have taught me that the current system of long-term care and connection to needed services is not taking care of what we caregivers and those we are caring need.”
Caring for the caregiver at home is very important.
Family members who care for their loved ones, are often, left to navigate a bewildering array of services, assuming that they know the options available and are confident of the choices they are being asked to make. Once an individual is confronted with a care-giving imperative along with the sheer emotional and physical toll of caring for a loved one, finding and accessing available resources presents a new challenge.
The professional community and individual agencies have organized a variety of services, both at the community level and nationwide. Federal and state aging agencies increasingly focus on initiating programs directed toward healthful lifestyles for older adults, encompassing exercise, nutrition, fall prevention, and self-care. For fragile and vulnerable elders, programs are in place to provide in-home care services for daily tasks, respite provisions, and home modifications.
Hospital discharge planners, area agencies on aging, senior centers, social workers, geriatric specialists, and allied professionals provide local referrals and sources, including caregiver support groups in diverse programs at separate locations. What is missing among these silos of care is an understanding of what the caregiver really needs: recognition and coordination to connect to help.
While the medical community is becoming educated in geriatric patient care, family caregivers are often unintentionally overlooked in the process. They may be present in the office as loved one’s advocates, but caregivers are – or often feel – invisible.
While caregivers are deep in the process of caregiving, they benefit from morale boosters of concern for their health and well-being and a friendly copilot to navigate the world of special resources needed for such challenges. Professionals need to recognize that caregivers want to be acknowledged, understood, and valued as individuals placed in emotionally charged situations in the continuum of their caregiving roles.
Professionals can provide links to legal, medical, and other care issues for what lies ahead, beginning with answers to the questions “Where do I start?” ‘What will I do?” and “How do I find out what is available?”. Caring for caregivers early on helps strengthen them and the quality of their care. Even the most capable families can benefit from consultation because they don’t have experience with the new and complex challenges of caregiving and service arrangements. Our agency professionals will help caregivers navigate the resources in the community or consider in-home care assistance to ease some of the stress.
Looking forward, professionals are the natural locus point to provide the “connective tissue” between the array of caregiving services, coordination, and access to care plus the emotional support in valuing their roles. Right Accord will do just that to care for the caregiver in the home.
To demonstrate how this new era of caregiving connectivity may work, Right Accord in Sarasota, Florida collaborates with local agencies in Sarasota, Venice, Bradenton and Longboat areas. To provide these connections between professionals,caregivers, and older adults, there are different locations that can serve as starting places where caregivers can learn what local resources are available, find a care manager, and participate in support groups and individual counseling.
CAREGIVER CONNECTION is a program in Sarasota, Florida sponsored by Sarasota Memorial Health Care System and the Neuro Challenge Department proving monthly caregiver support groups. Program is fun and interactive while giving tips on improving coping skills, guidance and good advice from others sharing the same experiences. There’s complimentary refreshments, no reservations necessary and most of all it’s free.
The program is held monthly at the Sarasota Institute for Advanced Medicine located at 5880 Rand Blvd. Sarasota, Forida. The progra is facilitated by Marilyn Tait, Neuro Science Educator, Patient Advocate for Sarasota Memorial Health Care System. Below is the 2009 schedule of programs held every second Wednesday of each month from 9:30am – 10:30am.
August 12 – “How To Be Your Own Best Friend”
September 9 – “How to Cope With Role Reversals and More, More, More”
October 14 – “How to Rest, Relax & Rejuvenate”
November 11 – “How to See Beyond The Surface to What Lies Beneath”
December 9 – “How To Live Today & Hope For Tomorrow”
Excerpted from Aging Well by Jody Dunn
Tags: aging, caregiver, caregivers, in-home care assistance, longboat key, sarasota, senior care, seniors, venice
