Are you caring for a senior aged loved one?
What a rewarding experience this is for you. Your loved one, too, is experiencing top-notch care from the comfort of home, which is some of the best care there is.
However, there are times when you shouldn’t attempt to care for a senior all by yourself. Here are seven signs that it may be time to choose a home health care service to take the reins for everyone’s benefit.
7 Signs for When to Hire your Senior or Elderly Parent Home Care Services
1. Missed Doctor Appointments
Many senior-aged patients have one or more medical conditions that require regular doctor’s office visits. Whether your senior has high blood pressure, diabetes, or any other ailment, ensure all doctor’s appointments are being kept.
Unfortunately, some senior patients may forget their appointment times, or they may lack transportation and so end up skipping the appointments altogether.
A home health care team can ensure your loved one always gets to the doctor, no matter what. With reliable transportation and the ability to keep to a regular schedule, your loved one will have no trouble seeing all necessary doctors for optimal health upkeep.
2. Slips & Falls
Major slips and disastrous falls are common for many aging seniors. Getting up and stumbling over one’s feet can occur, and so can tripping over unruly dogs and cats. Clutter on the floor turns the entire home into an obstacle course, and with some medications causing dizziness and bifocals skewing your loved one’s perception, and you never know when your senior may take a tumble for the worse.
A home health care service can keep an eye on your loved one to ensure no accidents happen. Home health care personnel are also accustomed to making home safety recommendations to make the home fall-proof and extra safe.
3. Medication Mishaps
The average senior citizen takes multiple prescription medications for a variety of ailments. Some are taken once per day and others twice or more per day. Some medications should be taken in the morning and others at night. Who can keep up with that kind of medicine schedule?
All it takes is one pill too many for all sorts of bad effects to occur. Don’t take the chance.
A home health service will keep your loved one on the right medication schedule, guaranteed. When a home health professional starts working with your senior, all medications will be assessed, and your loved one put on a strict schedule to prevent any medication mistakes.
4. Deteriorating Pets & Plants
If you notice that your loved one isn’t keeping up with the household responsibilities, home health care may be needed. This lack of self-care is usually first apparent in dying plants and pets that get too skinny from irregular feeding or pet messes that never get cleaned up.
Home health experts won’t just keep your patient’s spirits up and his or her health in good order, but they’ll also help with all day-to-day activities, including watering plants and feeding pets.
5. Distracted Driving
Many of us think of text messaging as the biggest form of distracted driving. Seniors, too, have a form of distracted driving that can come from forgetting where they are momentary. They may hit the gas instead of the break, or vice versa, causing all sorts of problems, including destructive and deadly car accidents.
Home health care experts won’t just take your loved one to the doctor’s office, but transportation will be available wherever your senior aged loved one wants to go for a safe and eventful trip.
6. Increasingly Forgetful
Is the senior citizen forgetting names and important dates? This could be an indication that your loved one is exhibiting symptoms of dementia or Alzheimer’s disease.
When extreme forgetfulness rears its ugly head, it’s time to call in the professionals. Home care experts know how to give specialized attention to patients suffering from all types of debilitating ailments, including Alzheimer’s and others.
7. Lowered Quality of Life
When your loved seems down from lack of companionship and doesn’t seem able to care for him or herself any longer, the solution isn’t to look for a senior living home. Instead, call Infinite Love Home Care, where we offer top-notch home health care you can trust.
Your loved one will get to retain complete independence while receiving expert medical care, Alzheimer’s care, physical therapy, speech therapy, and more. Call today to schedule a free consultation to see if we’re the ideal fit for your loved one in need.
