Cobb's Home Care Specialists

11/07/2015

http://www.helpguide.org/articles/stress/caregiving-stress-and-burnout.htm

06/13/2014

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ey9eFl6w54c

http://cobbshomecare.com (336) 602-2940 Cobb's Home Care Specialists Winston Salem reviews 5 Star Review Very warm and caring. The services they offer make a...

06/13/2014

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vvzNJRmjUw

http://cobbshomecare.com (336) 602-2940 Cobb's Home Care Specialists Winston Salem reviews New Review We moved my Aunt who was 88 at the time to North Caroli...

06/12/2014

06/07/2014

What To Do When… Mom Wanders

Is your dad, spouse or other relative with Alzheimer’s breaking away from the family on an outing… getting up in the middle of the night and leaving the house…. wandering out of the doctor’s office when you turn your back for a minute?
Here’s what you can do:
Put a baby monitor in their room. If your loved one gets up, or starts moving around, you’ll hear them before they’re able to get too far.
Put locks on exterior doors. But have them installed out of the sightline, close to the bottom or the top of the door.
Install an electronic alarm system. Or hang small bells on door k***s, as a less expensive alternative.
Use nightlights throughout the house. Don’t try to discourage the wandering by keeping the house dark. It won’t change the behavior and it’s unsafe.
Get ID jewelry. Medic Alert bracelets are engraved with your most urgent medical needs, your special MedicAlert ID number, and the 24-hour Emergency Hotline for first responders to call. (medicalert.ca). Make sure, when you are out and about, that your charge carries identification. Finally, write your name and phone number on a piece of paper they carry in their wallet or pocket.
Consider Location-Based Mapping System (LBS). This will let you use your computer to monitor your loved one’s location. Comfort Zone (alz.org/comfortzone) is designed for people with Alzheimer’s. Your charge wears or carries a small device similar to a pager, which communicates their location to the web-based application and sends you regular updates.
Buy brightly colored clothing, especially pajamas and housecoats. If they wander at night, the increased visibility will make them easier to spot.
Know your neighbors. Make sure they’re aware that your charge shouldn’t be out alone, or at nighttime. Since most Alzheimer’s sufferers don’t go far, the people close to you are your best alarm system.
Why do wanderers wander?
Your charge could be overwhelmed, so it’s sometimes recommended that Alzheimer’s sufferers avoid loud, crowded spaces. But some wanderers leave to fulfill a perceived mission. They may, for example, believe they need to go to work, get on a bus, help a friend move… things they no doubt did at an earlier time.
Three out of five seniors with dementia go missing at some point; 75 percent of them are found 2.4 km (1.67 miles) from where they disappeared.

Further sources for info:
agingcare.com/Articles/alzheimers-bad-behaviors-impact-caregivers-148184.htm
healthcentral.com/alzheimers/c/43/1701/tips-loved/2
helpforalzheimersfamilies.com/alzheimers-dementia-dealing/guide/manage-wandering/
alz.org/care/alzheimers-dementia-wandering.asp

Jasmine Miller is editor of Women of Influence and a writer based in Toronto, Canada
The post What To Do When… Mom Wanders appeared first on Alz Live.

06/07/2014

Mom Just Wants Someone To Listen

The other day, I had a conversation that is unfortunately common when people find out what I do for a profession.
It went something like this. “So Caregiver Cards, what’s that?”
I respond, “Caregiver Cards is a picture-based, visual-support product that I created which helps caregivers to communicate easier with persons living with Alzheimer’s, dementia, or memory or speech disorders.”
“Oh.” he responds “My mother has Alzheimer’s disease. She lives in a care home.” Small talk about his mother continues, and then the statement that I hear so often is delivered.
“Mom, don’t you remember you have a disease that makes it hard for you to remember who I am?” (In response to when the son visits mom and she is unsure of who he is.)
This is shortly followed by… “Mom, don’t you remember you sold your car to your granddaughter.” (In response to Mom constantly looking out the window asking where her car is because she has to get home.)
I listen, non-judgmentally, and then ask, “What is your Mom’s response to when you remind her that she has a disease that affects her memory, or when she doesn’t have a car any longer?” He takes a moment and then states, “Most of the time she doesn’t say much, but sometimes you can see that she does remember she has Alzheimer’s.”
I was able to share a little advice about better communication techniques during his visits with Mom, like not reminding Mom that she forgets, and addressing the underlying feelings of anxiety and fear. However, advice was not what this individual was looking for. He simply wanted to share that we both had a connection to Alzheimer’s disease. He wanted someone to listen to him.
Hmm. I have to ask myself, What is the point,of these conversations that he is having with Mom? For whose benefit is it? While having the best intentions, this family member is more focused on gaining moments when there is clarity, not acceptance of the disease and it’s impact on Mom.
His focus is seeing when Mom is “Mom” and not “Mom with Alzheimer’s.” I sympathize with this “coping skill.” Alzheimer’s Disease is tough for everyone involved. It’s okay to say “This is hard.” It is difficult! What’s interesting is that what he wants and what his Mother wants are not that far removed. They both want someone to listen!
The most commonly recognized symptom (and one of the earliest to manifest) of Alzheimer’s Disease is an inability to acquire new memories and difficulty recalling recently observed facts.
Alzheimer’s does not affect all memory capacities equally. Episodic memory (memory of autobiographical events) is the first to be affected. Short-term memory, or working memory, (the ability to store information in the mind in an active, readily available state for short periods of time) follows next. Semantic memory (memory of the meaning of words or facts in the world) and procedural memory (how to perform tasks and skills) are lastly affected. Sourced from John Hopkins Medicine.
Do they remember that they already told you, or what you told them? Can they remember what was already said? The answer is NO to both.
Allowing for reminiscing is important when we communicate with persons living with Alzheimer’s and dementia.
However, I want to address what we can learn from this; what words we can start saying that promote connections, conversations, and understanding, not what points out the shortcomings related to dementia which can lead to embarrassment, frustration or anger.
The phrase, “Tell me about it” or “Tell me about the time…” should be found in every caregiver’s survival kit. It should be waiting at the tip of our tongue, whenever we visit our loved one. It should feel natural and automatic.
Why? Quite simply, because it encourages communication! The person with Alzheimer’s wants to talk. They want to feel comforted, safe, and assure. Mostly, the want someone to listen.
How many of us, when we are going through a stressful time in life, or are faced with a dilemma/decision, just need someone to listen? We don’t necessarily need the answer. We really just need a moment of someone’s time so that we don’t feel so lost or alone in our choices or in this world. The same is said for someone living with Alzheimer’s.
Mom wants someone to listen to her.
If you can remember this. If you can share empathy and compassion, treating the person living with dementia, as a “person first, who happens to have dementia,” then asking them to “tell me more” will come more naturally. You will be a friend in their eyes. Even if they may not remember who you are most days, I can assure you that they will remember the feelings they get when you are around, and that is one of care, of friendship.
Another example of ways to improve communication, that I noticed from speaking with this person, is to not argue with his Mom’s reality. Support her reality. Validate her feelings. It lets them know that they are not alone and then you can redirect them into another thought.
For example “It sounds like you really want to go somewhere.” “Where do you want to go?” Once they tell you where it is, than they’ve given you a great opportunity to engage in the “tell me about” approach. “Tell me about home.” “Tell me about Mom and Dad.” Then ask for one of their favorite stories about that person or location.
You are allowing them to reminisce.You are connecting. These moments are important for you to listen and remember their story for them. Because at some point in the disease they will forget how to share these stories, and it will be your privileged honor to remember for them.
Barbara Worthington is the founder of memory cue card site caregivercards.biz
Reprinted with permission of Barbara Worthington
The post Mom Just Wants Someone To Listen appeared first on Alz Live.

06/06/2014

The Joy of Illogical Chat

A few years back I found myself testing the value of simple human validation.
My dad had been institutionalized for Alzheimer’s. Each time I visited his care facility there was a phalanx of patients sitting opposite the elevator doors. The patients vied for seats in the area with the highest traffic.
Initially, I steeled myself to this gauntlet. These wraiths awaited each visitor like the ancient mariner waited on the wedding guest. Only these petitioners were addled and agitated. Little was left of their vitality or coherence. What remained was an aching need to connect.
Each time I arrived, a patient would approach me and launch into a nonsensical conversation. Rather than brush them off, I decided to play along with the libretto of lunacy.
Marian worried about the luggage. She rose from her chair and approached me as I got off the elevator.
When will the luggage be delivered?
The luggage?
It was like a bizarre version of theatre sports wherein my identity in the game would be provided by clues.
Could you check with the purser?
It appears we are on a ship.
Of course: can you tell me exactly what it is you’re concerned about?
Our luggage; are you sure it all got on board?
Oh yes, I personally made sure that every last piece was boarded.
Including the tricycle?
Tricycle?! Okay ….
Yes, I carried that on board myself.
Here, her features softened. She chuckled:
Oh, that’s grand: Gregory will be wanting that tricycle.
Well, not to worry: it’ll all be delivered to your stateroom shortly. Is there anything else I can do for you?
She seemed happy to return to the promenade deck of her imaginings.
Another day, another resident approached me.
So, are you interested or not?
She plants herself in front of me, arms folded and impatient.
Well, I haven’t quite decided.
I was buying time; I had no idea what it was that I was supposed to have been deliberating on.
This sort of opportunity doesn’t come along very often, you know.
Again, confrontational and demanding.
Yes I’m aware of that …
Still, hoping for a clue.
It’s a spectacular piece of property.
Finally! The tip-off.
Yes, indeed, it is. It’s not often a parcel like that comes on the market.
She seems pleased that I’d acknowledged the value on the line.
That’s right! So, are you interested, or not?
The conversation was illogical, of course. But as we spoke I watched something change within her. It wasn’t so much that she became lucid, but that a weight seemed to lift from her shoulders. Her face brightened, her eyes lost their worry. Within this exchange and my cooperation with it, she seemed to regain some foothold in the world that had slipped away from her.
We decided to speak further about the decision upon our next meeting. With her hand now firmly on the tiller of her affairs, she seemed content to let the matter slip. She had attended to business; all was right with the world.
I came to know many of them by name. I knew their preoccupations and concerns. I knew who bullied whom, and who had no visitors. I made it a point to address them by name and to touch them, lay a hand on their arm. It might have been presumptuous, but I often touched their faces.
They liked that. So did I.

Reprinted with the express permission of National Post, a division of Postmedia Network Inc.
The post The Joy of Illogical Chat appeared first on Alz Live.

06/06/2014

Delayed deliveries, forgotten habits

Sarah Markus was always telling jokes.
We laughed together constantly. As I grew up, we developed a routine: Grandma would tell a joke, I would laugh and she would respond, “I love you Bareket. I’ve trained you so well, you laugh at all my jokes.”
Sarah was a bright, lovely woman. Born in 1917, she arrived in Canada from Poland at the young age of 4 and picked Dec. 4, the first day of Hanukkah, as her birthday.
And for the last five years of her life she lived with dementia.
Caring for Sarah was challenging for my whole family, but even in her deteriorating state, Grandma maintained her sense of humor. She joked with young male doctors about taking her out on a date, quickly following up with a comment about her beautiful eligible granddaughter.
It’s difficult to find humor in the face of dementia, but it can bring lightness to the heaviest situation. Sarah, for example, had a very funny moment during her illness – even if she wasn’t aware of it. I share the story for two reasons: I hope it helps others find humor and lightness as they care for a loved one living with Alzheimer’s or dementia. And because it would have made Sarah laugh.
Bareket Kezwer with her grandmother, Sarah Markus.
My grandmother smoked a pack of ci******es a day for 60 years. Whenever we went to the apartment where Sarah and her older sister, Lillian, lived, my grandma would go in her bedroom when she wanted a cigarette and I would keep her company. I remember when I was really young, we would sit in the corner of her bedroom and I’d try on her jewelry and we’d talk about how incredible life would become when I learned how to read. I loved having her all to myself.
By 2008 when she was 91, Sarah had deteriorated significantly. She rarely got dressed or left the apartment. Her cognitive function was low. Her elderly sister was the primary caregiver, and even though Lillian had given up smoking in 1977, and even though my mother hated Sarah’s smoking, we used to buy ci******es by the carton so that Lillian wouldn’t have to leave Grandma alone in the apartment to buy ci******es.
One afternoon, we must have fallen behind in our deliveries because as Sarah and Lillian were sitting on the couch watching TV, Sarah said, “Lillian, where are my ci******es? I want a cigarette.” Lillian responded, “Don’t you remember? You quit smoking 20 years ago.”
My grandmother thought about this for a moment, and then responded, “Oh, I must have forgot, I can’t remember things as well I used to.”
And she never smoked again.
Bareket Kezwer is an artist, designer and an associate at Kriss Communications in Toronto.
The post Delayed deliveries, forgotten habits appeared first on Alz Live.

06/06/2014

Touching a Chord

Launched in January 2013, the Music & Memory Project aims to distribute 10,000 iPods to people with Alzheimer’s and dementia throughout the City of Toronto within three years.
Speaking to a small group of experts and caregivers gathered to discuss the impacts of the Alzheimer Society of Toronto’s Music & Memory iPod Project, Dr. Bob Lester offers testimonial of the dramatic effect that music has on his wife, who is in the advanced stages of dementia.
“It was astounding.”
“Within literally seconds, I could see my wife seeming to relax – the stress in her face was disappearing. And I was even more amazed – my wife has very little spontaneous movement – when I looked down and saw her foot tapping.”
Using music to help people with Alzheimer’s or other forms of dementia is a growing niche in the long-established field of music therapy. Personalized music can improve mood, cognition, and can act as conduit of memory and communication. Pairing music therapy with iPods was a stroke of genius.
Founded by social worker Dan Cohen in the U.S. in 2006, the innovative Music & Memory project was developed to share the power of music in a simple and accessible way, without the need for formal therapeutic intervention.
By providing access and education, and creating a network of partner organizations and care facilities, the project aims to make the use of personalized therapeutic music a healthcare standard. Today, there are 60 facilities throughout North America with music programs.
Inspired by the work of Music & Memory and its recent viral success, the Alzheimer’s Society of Toronto (AST) created the iPod Project, funded by The George C. Hunt Family Foundation and the Ontario Trillium Foundation.
The AST, which provides the iPods, training, and technical support at no cost, requires only that the recipient, with assistance from a caregiver, provide a personalized list of their favorite music from the past.
They are reconnecting with their loved ones on a level that has often been lost.
So far, the AST has distributed over 1,200 iPods, and the results, though diverse, are almost uniformly positive. Though each individual’s reaction to music is unique, personalized music tends to have a calming effect while inspiring deep emotional recall for even those in the late stages of dementia.
For caregivers, music can offer much-needed respite. “Caregivers are reporting that they are a lot more confident in the care of their family member,” explains iPod Project coordinator Sabrina McCurbin.
“What’s more, they are reconnecting with their loved ones on a level that has often been lost. I receive calls from caregivers to say that they danced with their spouse in the kitchen for the first time in years when a particular song is played.”
Dr. Paul Williams of the Balance of Care Research and Evaluation Group, who examined the results from the first year of the iPod Project, suggests that the project may also have positive impacts on the broader healthcare system.
Dr. Williams found that the use of personalized music is particularly effective with individuals displaying behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia, which include things like aggression, anxiety, and depression. These symptoms, which Dr. Williams argues are too often treated with drugs, can be alleviated almost immediately by personalized music. The availability of an iPod can ease the burden faced by care workers in what are often understaffed long-term care facilities.
Dr. Williams also found that with increased confidence and support, caregivers participating in the project were more willing to support their loved ones at home, which remains imperative as the population affected by Alzheimer’s and dementia continues to rise dramatically in Canada.
“There is massive potential here,” Dr. Williams concludes. “It’s low-cost, low-risk, and if it doesn’t work, it still gains you a lot of important resources all around. It’s time to scale this thing up.”
Questions?
Please contact the iPod Program Coordinator:
Sabrina McCurbin
416-640-6305
Email: smccurbin@alzheimertoronto.org
To hook up with this wonderful program, go to the Alzheimer Society Toronto iPod project page, here.
Richie Assaly is a Toronto-based writer.
The post Touching a Chord appeared first on Alz Live.

06/06/2014

When did it begin – who knows?

When we’re close to something every day, it’s hard to discern a change. When does autumn really begin? What do we notice each day? Not much, but soon the leaves have changed colors, then begun falling, and ultimately rest on the ground. We don’t know which leaves went which days – but we know when they’re partially gone. Then we know when they’re totally gone.
My mother was a brilliant, fun woman with a big heart and a smile and good word for everyone. Frequently employee of the month/year wherever she worked, her last job was as a purchasing agent at Marina Mercy Hospital in Marina del Rey, California, from which she retired at age 69 and remained in Playa del Rey, CA, until 2003 at age 89, when she returned to Denver where she grew up and where we share a house now.
She alway enjoyed good health and now, at 96, is still quite healthy, with blood pressure 120/68 and no ailments. The same spring isn’t in her step as it was at 89, but she climbs nine stairs to her bedroom several times a day and accompanies me to shop, pushing a cart from front to back of the largest stores.
So what happened and when?
Obviously good physical health doesn’t prevent deterioration of the mind – or Mom would still be a brilliant woman. Maybe she is inside her head, but I don’t think so. Thank God that all of the leaves haven’t fallen and we enjoy some good moments together. Now, many of the simplest things often don’t make sense to her – how to put sugar and creamer in her coffee, at times how to tie her shoes. But it didn’t start there. Just like the arrival of autumn, I can’t put a date on it, just venture a guess.
If this gradual loss of cognition is in someone you see frequently, you won’t know when either, but one day you’ll notice that something, or somethings, aren’t quite right. Another agent in my real estate office noticed that her husband was quite confused pulling on a sweater.
My inclination was to correct my mother about a mistaken memory or doing something unusual like putting the knives and forks in the wrong places on the table. I’d think I’d corrected the problem but as time went on, I observed that the memory and silverware are still fuzzy and there are more and more things off the mark. Too many, in fact to try to correct in her mind.
You’ll suspect, hope not, then know.
Sorry. Life is dished out. My mother is still basically happy and seems pretty oblivious to her condition. I, on the other hand, am continually trying to adjust to it. Tonight at dinner she asked, “Where do you live?” Other times, usually in the mornings, she seems to get it.
This blog will continue indefinitely as I share my thoughts, feelings about the gradual loss of most of a mother who was so with it and vibrant for most of my life. I’ll no doubt share some of the good times and delightful episodes in her life. I invite your comments. Perhaps you have thoughts or suggestions that would help us all live with the problem while still remembering to say “I love you, Mom (or Dad, or Grandpa) ” every single day.