Home Care Versus Nursing Home Care

Most elders would prefer to stay in their own homes, where they know their neighbors and can associate memories with each piece of furniture and object around them, rather than move to an institution as they age.

Things that can make “aging in place” — the current term for staying in one’s own home as one ages — problematic are tasks such as cooking, cleaning, toileting, shopping, doing laundry, and driving, as well as falls, which for frail elders could initiate a downward spiral.

Support systems

• Help could come from family members, friends, or neighbors, who take care of the specific thing the elder has trouble with — such as doing laundry or shopping.
• Or, some elders turn to their religious community, as often there are volunteers willing to enable a senior to age in place.

• Home care agencies can be hired to provide the extra help needed for the senior to be able to age in place. In some cases, expenses will be reimbursed by Medicare, but seniors will need to check with the home care agency to find out about this possibility.

New technology can help seniors

• Electronic devices are now available to help monitor whether or not a senior has taken his or her medication — and if not, to remind the senior — or to determine whether a senior has opened the refrigerator.
• Emergency buttons can be worn around the neck and pressed if a health or other emergency should occur, in which case a person will speak to the senior through the device, assess the situation, and call for appropriate help.
• Cameras can be installed to track a senior’s movements, allowing adult children to monitor the senior and be assured that he or she is functioning well.
• New devices are constantly being invented, and they can make an enormous difference in a senior’s ability to age in place.

With all of these options available, aging in place is an increasingly viable choice. Seniors and their loved ones need to assess whether this alternative is indeed best, the risk being that the senior may become too socially isolated despite being in familiar neighborhoods and homes.

Elderly women benefit strongly from nutrition and lifestyle changes, new research reveals

A new study reveals that it is never too late to make lifestyle changes that dramatically reduce your risk of cancer. It contradicts the common myth that it’s too late to make changes if you are in your 50’s or 60’s. In contrast, the study revealed that out of 29,000 women between the ages of 55 to 69 whose lifestyle habits were tracked, those who followed healthy recommendations such as eating fruits and vegetables and avoiding tobacco use were remarkably healthier 12 years later.

The study revealed that 22% of the cancers that did occur could have been avoided if all the women in the study group had followed all of the health recommendations. It also revealed that 31% of the cancers would have been avoided if people had stopped smoking tobacco and that 100% of the cancers would have been avoided if they had died at an earlier age, which just goes to show you that if you can’t prevent disease, taking antidepressant is always a good defense because it increases your risk of committing suicide, meaning you won’t get the disease in question because you’re already dead. Interestingly, only a third of the women in the study met the guidelines to eat at least five servings of vegetables and fruits daily.

Grace Home Care Has Great Care Assistants Available For The Holidays.

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Processed meats cause Cancer!

Hundreds of cancer researchers took part in a five-year project spanning more than 7,000 clinical studies and designed to document the links between diet and cancer. Their conclusion, published in the World Cancer Research Fund’s report, Food, Nutrition, Physical Activity and the Prevention of Cancer: a Global Perspective (2007), has rocked the health world with a declaration that all people should immediately stop buying and eating processed meat products and that all processed meat should be avoided for life!

Processed meats, the report explains, are simply too dangerous for human consumption. And why? Because they contain chemical additives that are known to greatly increase the risk of various cancers, including colorectal cancer, breast cancer, prostate cancer, leukemia, brain tumors, pancreatic cancer and many more.

Grandmothers Raising A Grandchild Should Not Neglect Their Own Health

Precautionary health measures such as mammograms and cholesterol tests that identify the risk of heart disease are critical for the well-being of women over 50. Add the responsibility of providing sustained care for a grandchild, and these preventive examinations become even more important.

Yet, grandmothers in the first two years of caring for a grandchild take fewer preventive measures to protect their health compared to grandmothers the same age not raising children, according to a recent USC Davis School of Gerontology study.

According to the study, the number of custodial grandparents in the Unites States has nearly doubled since 1970, creating an emerging public health concern.

“Given that this group is already at risk for poor health outcomes because of their advanced age and vulnerability to chronic conditions, poor preventive behavior might precipitate a decline in health over time, a situation which could render the grandmother unable to care for her grandchild,” explained lead author, Lindsey Baker, a postdoctoral fellow at the USC Davis School.

In a recent paper in the Journal of Gerontology, Baker and co-author Merril Silverstein, USC professor of gerontology and sociology, looked at five types of protective health behaviors: influenza vaccination, cholesterol screening, monthly breast self-examination, mammography and Papanicolaou tests, or Pap tests, used to identify risk factors for cervical cancer.

Their findings indicate that grandmothers in the early stages of caring for a grandchild were significantly less likely than grandmothers not raising grandchildren to undergo flu vaccination or cholesterol screening. They were also less likely to get Pap tests, the researchers found.

However, after two years of caring for a grandchild, what was once a health burden becomes a potential health benefit. Baker and Silverstein found that caregiving grandmothers were increasingly health conscious once they made the transition into full-time care, becoming more likely than those not raising grandchildren to adopt preventative health measures such as flu vaccinations and monthly breast self-exams.

Elderly Cancer Survivors’ Ability To Function Improved By Home-Based Interventions

Climbing stairs, carrying groceries, taking a shower – these are activities that we take for granted; however, after a cancer diagnosis, many survivors are unable to function as they used to. Home-based diet and exercise interventions may improve physical functioning in older, long-term cancer survivors, according to data presented at the American Association for Cancer Research’s Seventh Annual International Conference on Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research.

Participants were randomly assigned to an intervention or a wait-list control group. Those in the intervention group received tailored mailed print materials on diet and exercise, a pedometer and exercise bands. For the first three weeks, participants received weekly phone calls, which tapered off to every two weeks and then once a month until the end of the study.

At the end of one year, researchers evaluated physical function, diet quality and physical activity using standard measures. Participants in the intervention group demonstrated significant improvements in their diet and exercise behaviors, and their weight status. What’s more, according to the SF-36 physical function test, participants in the intervention group had a 2.5 point decline compared with a 5.3 point decline in the control group. Similar differences were seen in measures of basic lower extremity and advanced lower extremity functioning. Overall, the magnitude of effect was similar to preventing physical function losses comparable to that imposed by ischemic heart disease.

The ability to perform moderate to vigorous physical activity improved as well. In the intervention group, participants increased their ability by 44.9 minutes a week compared with 29.7 minutes per week in the control group.

Body mass index declined by 0.8 in the active group compared with 0.3 in the control group.

“Last year alone, we spent $219 billion on cancer care, but only 40 percent of that was spent on treatment,” said Demark-Wahnefried. “The majority of costs were due to lost productivity and health problems that surfaced afterwards.”

Use of Bright Lighting May Improve Dementia Symptoms

The use of daytime bright lighting to improve the circadian rhythm of elderly persons was associated with modest improvement in symptoms of dementia, and the addition of the use of melatonin resulted in improved sleep, according to a study in the June 11 issue of JAMA.

“In elderly patients with dementia, cognitive decline is frequently accompanied by disturbances of mood, behavior, sleep, and activities of daily living, which increase caregiver burden and the risk of institutionalization,” the author writes. These symptoms have been associated with disturbances of the circadian rhythm (the regular recurrence, in cycles of about 24 hours, of biological processes or activities). “The circadian timing system is highly sensitive to environmental light and the hormone melatonin and may not function optimally in the absence of their synchronizing effects. In elderly patients with dementia, synchronization may be [diminished] if light exposure and melatonin production are reduced.”

Rixt F. Riemersma-van der Lek, M.D., of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, Amsterdam, and colleagues conducted a trial at 12 elderly group care facilities in the Netherlands that evaluated the effects of up to 3.5 years of daily supplementation of bright light and/or melatonin on a number of health outcomes, including symptoms of dementia and sleep disturbances. The study included 189 facility residents, average age 85.8 years; 90 percent were female and 87 percent had dementia.

Six of the facilities had bright lighting installed in ceiling-mounted fixtures. Lights were on daily between approximately 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Participants were randomized to receive evening melatonin (2.5 mg) or placebo and participated an average of 15 months (maximum period of 3.5 years).

The researchers found that bright light lessened cognitive deterioration by a relative 5 percent, reduced depressive symptoms by a relative 19 percent and diminished the gradual increase in functional limitations by a relative 53 percent.

Melatonin reduced the time to fall asleep by a relative 19 percent and increased total sleep duration by 6 percent, but adversely affected caregiver ratings of withdrawn behavior and mood expressions. The addition of bright light improved the adverse effect on mood. In combination with the bright light, melatonin reduced aggressive behavior by a relative 9 percent.

“In conclusion, the simple measure of increasing the illumination level in group care facilities [improved] symptoms of disturbed cognition, mood, behavior, functional abilities, and sleep. Melatonin improved sleep, but its long-term use by elderly individuals can only be recommended in combination with light to suppress adverse effects on mood. The long-term application of whole-day bright light did not have adverse effects, on the contrary, and could be considered for use in care facilities for elderly individuals with dementia,” the authors write.

Grace Home Care has great Care Assistants available for all shifts.

Grace Home Care has several qualified, loving, and caring Care Assistants available for all shifts. Whether you need assistance for part of the day, the night, or a 24 hour live-in shift, GHCS can provide you with the impeccable care services that you need. We also provide Care Assistants to Nursing Homes, Adult Family Homes, and Hospitals.

So call today for more information.

Telephone: 206.328.6251

E-mail: ttgracehomecare@gmail.com

How to Massage Head of the Elderly .

Learn how to massage the neck and head of the elderly with these great tips.

First sign of nursing home abuse.

Bedsores and bruises are often the first signs of nursing home neglect. If you notice any of these signs on a loved one that is living in a nursing home, please ask questions to ensure your loved one is safe, and being properly cared for.