Elder Care

Written by a psychologist and a physician who have extensive experience in treating the elderly and first-hand knowledge of what it is like to care for an elderly parent, Eldercare offers practical, down-to-earth information on how to care for older persons. Emphasis is given to questions about the aging process, maintaining maximum independence, the pluses and minuses of home care, preparing a safe environment, how to choose a nursing home, nutrition and exercise, dealing with behavioral problems and basic medical concerns. Eldercare is concerned with every aspect of the aging process, including the importance of family support and role reversal when the adult child takes on the responsibility of making the choices for an aging parent. Blending professional expertise and personal experience, the authors discuss not only the challenges confronting the aged and those who care for them, but also the opportunities for family growth and personal fulfillment.

Culled from the author's real-world experiences, this guide to the tasks of being an elder caregiver contains heartfelt stories as well as a framework that allows readers to face their challenges in an organized manner. By simply implementing a couple of Dr. Marion's 10 steps, caregivers can quickly ease caregiving panic by equipping themselves with the knowledge necessary to make informed decisions about everything from adapted equipment for the elderly and housing to financial and legal issues.--From publisher description.

The challenges of life for elders can be daunting. Whether you are an elder or a caregiver, you don't have to do this alone. I know the journey isn't easy, and through my experience as an elder care nurse, and your effort and greater understanding, we can help develop a life that elders want and deserve, even when they need assistance. In this book, I will help you understand the impacts of aging, challenges of daily life, assisted living, memory care, skilled nursing, home health and hospice. In addition, I will guide you on how to help your senior loved ones and determine how to integrate family and friends to assist with elder care. Navigating Elder Care provides you with concrete tools to manage the challenges and embrace multiple possibilities for supporting elders. The insights and guidance provided here are based on over a decade of experience, leadership, and education as a certified gerontology nurse working in senior living, elder care, and dementia support.

Assessing older adults, managing disorders and complications, avoiding drug dangers, and detecting abuse and neglect.

A USA Today BESTSELLER! "Informative. Complete. And practical. This book will guide family caregivers through the surprisingly complex world of senior care." —MEHMET OZ, M.D., New York Times bestselling coauthor of YOU: The Owner's Manual: The Complete All-in-One Care Guide Choosing the best care for your aging parents and other seniors in your life is not only complex, with multiple options available, it's also highly personal and often emotional. This essential resource—written by the founders of Home Instead Senior Care, the world's largest provider of nonmedical care for seniors—guides you through a comprehensive range of things to consider, step by step, so you can make better informed decisions and be confident that the senior in your life is receiving the best care possible. Checklists and diagnostics will help you: Decide if at-home care is the right choice for you and your loved ones Evaluate the pros and cons of retirement communities, adult care centers, nonmedical caregivers, assisted living facilities, nursing homes, and hospice Determine the costs of senior care options and find helpful support networks "This is not just another book about caring for aging parents. It's a great reference you'll use again and again. Stages doesn't shy away from the hard questions. Rather, it shows you how to confront them."—SUZANNE MINTZ, President/CEO, National Family Caregivers Association "Recognizing that there is no one-size-fits-all solution, this salient volume compassionately addresses a full range of hard-to-discuss subjects."--PUBLISHERS WEEKLY All of the authors' profits from the sale of this book will be donated to the Home Instead Senior Care Foundation. Paul and Lori Hogan founded Home Instead Senior Care in 1994. Now with 850 offices in 15 countries, Home Instead is recognized as a global leader and authority on senior care. Visit them at www.stagesofseniorcare.com.

"She shares with us her gold - the conception, trial and error implementation, and initial scientific investigation of a new, educationally-oriented treatment approach that she has named mindfulness-based elder care (MBEC)."-from the Foreword by Saki Santorelli, EdD, MA, Associate Professor of Medicine,Executive Director, Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and SocietyUniversity of Massachusetts Medical School Drawing on years of experience as a geriatric social worker and mindfulness-based stress reduction practitioner, the author has taken Jon Kabat-Zinn's Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction program and adapted it to the particular needs of elders, their families, and professional caregivers. Mindfulness practices focus on abilities, rather than disabilities, in order to provide paths to the inner strengths and resources that we all possess. McBee's Mindfulness-Based Elder Care conveys the benefits of mindfulness through meditation, gentle yoga, massage, aromatherapy, humor, and other creative therapies to this special population. She provides clear, concise instructions for her program, as well as a wealth of anecdotal and experiential exercises, to help readers at all levels of experience. Hers is the first book to fully explore the value of mindfulness models for frail elders and their caregivers. Features of this groundbreaking volume include: Valuable tips for establishing programs to address each population's specific needs and restrictions Designed for short classes or 8-week courses Detailed experiential exercises for the reader Replete with case studies Clear, easy-to-follow instructions for elders and caregivers at all levels This innovative book is suitable for use with a variety of populations such as nursing home residents with physical and cognitive challenges, community-dwelling elders, direct-care staff, and non-professional caregivers.

Combining expert knowledge and first-hand experience, a noted elder care researcher confronts the long-distance care of her own mother. For millions of Americans caregiving is the “new normal.” For Laura Katz Olson, a respected researcher of long-term care for the aging, Elder Care Journey chronicles the disruption of her world and how it is upended by the ever-increasing long-distance needs of her own mother. A healthy, Senior Olympics medal winner, Olson’s mother is slowly and steadily incapacitated by Parkinson’s disease and a gradual loss of vision. Thrust into a long-distance caregiving role, Olson finds her previous academic notions about assisting a frail parent increasingly at odds with the reality of the lived experience. In a narrative full of “ah-ha!” moments, tears, sighs, and outrage that will be familiar to many, Olson opens a window into the nursing home and home care industries that consume much in the way of taxpayer dollars, but often fail to deliver quality care. Olson’s personal story vividly demonstrates not only the overwhelming bureaucratic barriers faced by care-dependent seniors but also their beleaguered adult children’s attempts to ensure their parents’ health, safety, and well-being. “After losing two siblings, Laura Katz Olson is left singularly responsible for her physically active and lively mother, Dorothy, a thousand miles away, both young at heart and eagerly bicycling everywhere, but increasingly limited by the normal process of aging. Being an expert on aging and health care, Olson is at first confident as she tries to let her mother ‘age in place.’ More than anyone, she believes, she should know what to do. Shuttling between Florida and Pennsylvania, Olson settles into a crushing routine, and with each visit she finds incremental downward change in her mother’s health. Pulled by daughterly guilt at times, but also a wellspring of love, Olson is frank about the resentment she sometimes experiences. “With a unique perspective that links the systemic flaws in our policy approach to elder care to real-world experience, Olson exposes the challenges we all face or are likely to face. More than a personal story, but nevertheless an extremely compelling one, the book should be read by those confounded and frustrated, and by those without direct knowledge of what quietly repeats itself millions of times a day.” — Miriam Laugesen, Department of Health Policy and Management, Columbia University “In Elder Care Journey, Laura Olson tells the riveting story of helping her aging, disabled mother navigate the system of long-term services and supports. A renowned scholar of aging and long-term care policy, Dr. Olson was nevertheless unprepared for the daily frustrations involved in confronting a bewildering array of obstacles, deceptions, burdensome and repetitive procedures and paperwork, and catch-22s, ranging from the annoying to the downright dangerous. She shows how well-intentioned policies can fall far short of meeting people’s needs, especially for those in greatest need, in a system based on fragmented interests and private-sector profit maximization. Combining scholarly expertise with personal experience, she ends the book with a detailed but highly accessible analysis of the long-term care system and how it could be improved to the benefit of both taxpayers and beneficiaries. This book is a compelling read for policymakers and for students and scholars of health care and social welfare policy, highly recommended for undergraduate and graduate courses. The author’s experiences also provide helpful advice to caregivers on what to expect and how to deal with it, as well as reassurance that they are not alone.” — Christine L. Day, University of New Orleans “If a society is judged by how well it treats its most vulnerable members, Laura Katz Olson, a prominent health policy scholar, demonstrates that we have a long way to go in how we serve frail and disabled elders in need of long-term services and supports at the end of their lives. Olson develops a compelling narrative that describes the subtle and not-so-subtle indignities imposed on elders and their caregivers navigating the complex maze of health and social service systems at their hour of greatest need. Even an expert such as Olson struggled in light of the challenges posed by these impediments. “By connecting her own personal journey to the larger societal challenges within which her struggles are embedded, Olson makes a significant contribution to the literature that should be required reading for scholars, practitioners, and policymakers looking to advance the welfare of the nation’s most vulnerable citizens.” — Edward Alan Miller, author of Block Granting Medicaid: A Model for 21st Century Medicaid Reform? “This page-turner is at once a tender tale of a daughter’s devotion and a stinging indictment of the hugely complex and wholly inadequate American long-term care system. That an elder-care expert can barely navigate the Byzantine web of public and private insurance and services for her disabled mother is alarming enough. Truly horrific are the system’s shortcomings and the increasing role that for-profit providers play, fleecing and even abusing their customers. A startling wake-up call.” — Andrea Louise Campbell, author of Trapped in America’s Safety Net: One Family’s Struggle

A MacArthur Genius Grant recipient pioneers a radical change in how we interact with older loved ones, especially those experiencing dementia, as she introduces a proven method that uses the creative arts to bring light and joy to the lives of elders. In Creative Care, Anne Basting lays the groundwork for a widespread transformation in our approach to elder care and uses compelling, touching stories to inspire and guide us all—family, friends, and health professionals—in how to connect and interact with those living with dementia. A MacArthur Genius Grant recipient, Basting tells the story of how she pioneered a radical change in how we interact with our older loved ones. Now used around the world, this proven method has brought light and joy to the lives of elders—and those who care for them. Here, for the first time, everyone can learn these methods. Early in her career, Basting noticed a problem: today’s elderly—especially those experiencing dementia and Alzheimer’s— are often isolated in nursing homes or segregated in elder-care settings, making the final years of life feel lonely and devoid of meaning. To alleviate their sense of aloneness, Basting developed a radical approach that combines methods from the world of theater and improvisation with evidence-based therapies that connect people using their own creativity and imagination. Rooted in twenty-five years of research, these new techniques draw on core creative exercises—such as “Yes, and . . .” and “Beautiful Questions.” This approach fosters storytelling and active listening, allowing elders to freely share ideas and stories without worrying about getting the details “correct.” Basting’s research has shown that these practices stimulate the brain and awaken the imagination to add wonder and awe to patients’ daily lives—and provide them a means of connection, both with the world and with those caring for them. Creative Care promises to bring light and hope to a community that needs it most.

Family caregiving affects millions of Americans every day, in all walks of life. At least 17.7 million individuals in the United States are caregivers of an older adult with a health or functional limitation. The nation's family caregivers provide the lion's share of long-term care for our older adult population. They are also central to older adults' access to and receipt of health care and community-based social services. Yet the need to recognize and support caregivers is among the least appreciated challenges facing the aging U.S. population. Families Caring for an Aging America examines the prevalence and nature of family caregiving of older adults and the available evidence on the effectiveness of programs, supports, and other interventions designed to support family caregivers. This report also assesses and recommends policies to address the needs of family caregivers and to minimize the barriers that they encounter in trying to meet the needs of older adults.

A wide variety of legal issues surround caring for older individuals. Health and human service practioners need to plan, provide and evaluate geriatric care, while also understanding public policies. Legal knowledge is an essential part of caring for the elderly. Students and professionals must be able to deliver appropriate care while also being aware of any legal, ethical and pilitical issues that may arise. Legal Aspects of Elder Care provides a clear overview of geriatric policies and laws, enabling the reader to use informed decision-making with older clients.