Regular Visits And A Sense Of Agency For Seniors At Home
In past blog posts, we have talked about how professionals support seniors who are aging in their homes. This is a common choice for today’s elderly people who like to maintain the home front, but may need some help from time to time.
Regular visits by family and friends are also critically important. The home care people are on the team with you working on the same goals – to keep your loved one safe and healthy, and in a clean and safe environment!
With that in mind, regular visits do a lot of key things to support these outcomes. That’s something to think about when you are involved in the care of a home-bound senior.
Regular, Normal Check-ins
Most people don’t like the idea of a dedicated wellness or welfare check where somebody calls out of the blue to say “this is a welfare check and we’re assessing your emergency status.” Or maybe they just send the police out somewhere, which is sort of expensive from a taxpayer angle and can be problematic, or inefficient, in various ways.
Instead, just do a regular visit and check in at that time, and get the information that you’re looking for. Look for any obstacles or unsafe systems that could raise red flags and report to the other people on the care team.
Getting and Giving Information
As you are getting information from the elderly person about their situation in their home, you can also give them vital information they couldn’t otherwise get.
It might be as simple as a longer weather report. It might have to do with what’s happening outside – with new construction or traffic or anything else. Maybe the person you are visiting heard some basic news – and wants more details!
If the senior person can’t regularly move beyond their property and roam about their neighborhood, they will want to know about things that are happening there, and that’s another function of regular visits, that you shouldn’t overlook.
Running Errands
It’s important for seniors to feel that they have agency and are not completely housebound all the time. One way to do that is to offer to accomplish some errands for people who are stuck at home. Listen to them and find out what they would like to do if they could leave, and what they would like to acquire.
This type of work is critically important supporting seniors at home. Talk to us about the logistics of senior care – we pride ourselves on our dedication to elderly folks at home who need visitation and other services. We will bring our professional philosophy of business to be by your family’s side in taking care of an aging family member. Don’t wait to consult a local business that can help.
