Posts Tagged ‘caregiver’
WanderID – a new identification service
05/20/2013
WanderID is a new service that uses biometric face matching software to give you peace of mind, knowing that your loved one can be easily identified if they wander away or get lost.
You register and upload photos of a loved one to the WanderID website. If they then get lost, a police officer or EMT could use their smart phone to take a picture and search the company’s database. That’s when the service matches their photo with ones you uploaded, so you can get reconnected with loved one. It works just as well for small children or seniors with dementia. Read the rest of this entry »
Unpaid Caregiving in America
01/22/2013
According to AARP, 43.5 million Americans are caregivers, and although they do it out of love and obligation, caring for a loved one takes a personal and financial toll.
The economic impact is surprisingly high. It was over $480B/year in 2009, a figure that includes lost worker productivity, reduced earning capacity & retirement income, and increases in their own physical & emotional health and related costs. That’s about 3.2% of the U.S. GDP ($14.1 trillion in 2009). It’s more than the $361B in Medicaid spending. And it’s nearly as much as the $509B in 2009 Medicare spending. It’s also more than half of what we spend on defense. The burden is even worse for long-distance caregivers.
The infographic below details caregiving in the U.S. Read the rest of this entry »
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Home Renovations that can Save the Estate
12/20/2012
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Jack and Jill went up the hill Up Jack got, and home did trot, |
By Wayne Caswell
Scenario ONE
Jack and Jill were in their late 60s and had been married for 37 years when Jack suffered a severe stroke and required care beyond the abilities of his partner. After leaving the hospital, he went into a nursing home, and the family home was sold to pay for his care, which was expensive and projected exceed $84,000 per year.
Jill couldn’t maintain the big house herself and couldn’t afford it either, so she moved into a small apartment alone, without her lifelong mate. Being separated affected the couple’s morale, but worse was that it affected their health and their finances. Without long-term-care insurance, their life savings were depleted quickly before Medicaid finally kicked in. And now the grown children had two places to visit to support their declining parents. It didn’t have to be that way.
Scenario TWO
Just as in the nursery rhyme, Jack goes home and recovers more quickly there – in familiar and loving surroundings where Jane hires professionals to help care for him. That decision lets the couple stay together, and the kids have just one place to visit.
Universal Design was not offered when they built their home, and even though renovating the home for wheelchair accessibility often costs as much as $50,000, they felt it was financially better than the alternative. The project was entirely funded with home equity, so they didn’t even have to touch their retirement money, or the kid’s future inheritance. You see, Jack and Jill are like most American seniors, 90% of whom would rather live at home as long as possible and are willing to seek help to do that.
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Sensor Network to Protect the Elderly
12/08/2012
Marge Skubic developed a remote sensor network to monitor seniors’ activity and baseline health. Click image for credits and larger version
System monitors seniors’ health in the comfort of their own homes
By Marlene Cimons, National Science Foundation, December 6, 2012
Many elderly dread the prospect that chronic medical issues will force them to leave their homes for an assisted living facility or nursing home, making them dependent upon others for their care and personal needs. Sometime in the near future, however, new technology could help them remain in their homes longer, perhaps indefinitely, without having to give up their independence.
“Our goal is to keep people in their private homes for as long as possible,” says Marjorie Skubic, professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Missouri. “The idea is to detect functional decline or early signs of illness, so we can identify problems when they are very small and proactively address them before they become catastrophic. That way, mom won’t have to leave her home.” Read the rest of this entry »
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Before I die… Or before they do…
12/02/2012
Today I republish most of the content of a Huffington Post article that June Cohen wrote as part of TEDWeekends, a curated program about powerful “ideas worth spreading” each weekend.
The days between Thanksgiving and the New Year are always a time for reflection: On what’s been accomplished, on what remains ahead of us, and – most importantly – what matters most to you.
TED Fellow Candy Chang creates public art installations that explore the hidden landscape of near-death choices. Her work asks the audience, chalkboard-style, to fill in the blanks: “Before I die, I want to ________________.” Their answers have been, in turn: hilarious, heart-breaking, raw, real.
Talk Frankly with Aging Parents about Healthcare
08/19/2011
With a twice-a-day appearance by a caregiver, Steve Carley feels more at ease about his 96-year-old mother, Sara Carley, staying in her Far-Eastside home. The Carleys have used the service for two years. Photo by Charlie Nye, The Star
By Barb Berggoetz, USA Today and The Indianapolis Star
It’s 3 a.m., and your phone startles you out of a sound sleep.
Your 70-year-old mother has suffered a stroke. You rush to her house nearby to take her to the hospital.
But you’re not prepared. She’s incoherent. You forget the name of her primary care doctor and don’t know what medications she’s taking.
This may be an all-too-common scenario, as adult children struggle to take care of aging parents, and sometimes grandparents, and their often- complex medical needs.
Being a caregiver, even if it’s only part time or for emergencies, is challenging. When do you step in? How do you offer advice without being bossy? What can you do to help prevent emergencies? How do you best handle them when they happen?
15 Home Safety Tips for Care Givers of Dementia Sufferer
08/12/2011
Guest article by A.E.Churba, A.E.Churba Design, LLC
Dementia is a brain disorder that causes behavioral changes and changes in mental cognition for those living with the disease. Those living with dementia, a debilitating disease that includes the more readily recognized term Alzheimer’s disease, tend to lose the ability to remember names, arrange thoughts coherently and forget their current surroundings. As the disease progresses, communication becomes more difficult for the sufferer and agitation can occur.
Creating a home that is safe and comfortable for both the care giver and individual is very important. Following are 15 simple tips that can help care givers keep those afflicted with the disease safer in their home or living space.
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AARP Finds Toll On Family Caregivers Is ‘Huge’
07/18/2011
Valuing the Invaluable: The Growing Contributions and Costs of Family Caregiving is a new study by the AARP that estimates a value of $450 billion a year for work done by more than 40 million Americans caring for an elderly or disabled loved one. That may be a bargain for society, but it’s a “huge” burden on the family members.
Cymando Henley’s mom was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis as he started college. Now she’s in a wheelchair, and Henley has been taking care of her ever since – for nearly twenty years now – helping her in and out of bed and onto the toilet, and even rolling her over in the middle of the night if she gets uncomfortable. Social programs help pay for about 35 hours a week of in-home health care, but Henley puts in at least that much himself for free, on top of working at a full-time job. Such non-medical care from a professional can cost tens of thousands of dollars a year.
Listen to the story or read about it at NPR.org.
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Will Family Caregivers Drop Out of the Regular Workforce?
07/06/2011
Mark is unemployed and has a dilemma. As an older boomer, he’s often described as “overqualified” for many jobs, which really means he’s “too old.” And with no job, his time and declining finances are split between supporting school-age kids on one hand and caring for a live-in elderly parent on the other. Now a study by Boston College’s Center for Retirement Research shows that he’s not alone.
“Effect Of Informal Care On Work, Wages, And Wealth” concludes that long-term eldercare of a loved one can keep informal caregivers out of the labor force. The study examines this rhetorical question, “Do adult children who work less become informal caregivers, or do informal caregivers work less?
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