Geriatric Care Management Blog

I started in my last posting with a Q and A with John Wank, President of the Illinois Guardianship Association.  He continues this second with his answers to our questions in this the second in a three-part series. You are General Counsel and Director of Program with the Illinois Guardianship and Advocacy Commission. What does the Commission do? As the largest public guardian in the United States, the Office of State Guardian (OSG) handles personal or financial decisions for more than 5,000 disabled adults.  Nearly all OSG wards are indigent persons, with costs of care paid by public entitlements. Nearly all OSG front-line staff are Registered Certified Guardians (RCG) under the program administered by the Center for Guardianship Certification.

Legal Advocacy Service (LAS), is the statewide public agency that provides court-appointed legal counsel and representation to vulnerable children and adults with mental...

As a geriatric care manager, I work with court-appointed guardians.  You may recall from a blog last December, Caregiver or Guardian, we talked about guardianship.  I had the really good fortune to speak with John Wank, President of the Illinois Guardianship Association.  Mr. Wank also is General Counsel of the Illinois Guardianship and Advocacy Commission, a state agency.  He answered a lot of the questions I have heard from our clients.  This is going to take a few postings to get through them all.  Here are some questions and his answers for a start. What is a guardian? A guardian is a person appointed by a court to make personal or financial decisions for another person who has been found by the court to be incapacitated (a disabled person, under the Illinois definition) and unable to make decisions.  All guardianship in Illinois is governed...

One of the most common health issues that seniors deal with is depression.  According to the National Institutes of Mental Health, the prevalence of depression among the elderly is 1 to 5 percent overall.  Yet, it is not a “normal” part of aging; the incidence of depression increases to 11.5% of the hospitalized elderly and 13.5% of older individuals receiving home care.  As a caregiver, I get calls from caregivers and clients who are dealing with not just sadness, but real depression.  While some of these older adults will respond to anti-depressants, it is perhaps even more important to address what may really be just situational depression.  As a geriatric care manager, I am not a diagnostician and I cannot prescribe medications, but I can prescribe some changes in activities that can help the situational sadness that a lot of seniors may experience.

Seniors – along with...

The trees are budding and blooming, the bulbs have forced their way to the surface in beautiful blossoms and the birds are twittering and nesting.  Time to put away your winter coats, wool scarves and mittens, right?  Well, partly right. 

Your winter mittens have another useful purpose that can help you make home an easier place for your older loved ones.  As our bodies age, certain of our nerve pathways begin to fail, and the human anatomy uncannily reroutes many of the circuits as they stop firing.  But with age, more and more of those pathways may slow or fail for a variety of reasons, and it just makes it harder for older adults to do the simple manual tasks they used to do without even a thought. 

Turning a door knob, turning on a lamp or taking the lid off a jar become challenging, maybe even impossible.  It is hard for those of you who may be in the prime of your lives to really get this, no matter how empathetic, so I recommend an easy exercise to help you experience what this erosion of...

In my last posting I spoke to ways to improve the safety and accessibility of the bath for seniors who choose to age in place at home.  Some of the same preventive measures can apply to the kitchen, but the kitchen also poses some of its own unique hazards. 

As with the bath, beware of scatter rugs in front of sinks or food preparation areas.  Areas that may be targets for water or grease spills should have non-slip mats or nothing at all.   Check all thresholds leading to and from the kitchen to be sure there is nothing that may be trip hazard to individuals whose stride may be devolving to a shuffle.  For individuals who may be unsteady on their feet, consider grip bars in key spots as well as check the walkways in and around dining areas to make sure there is enough clearance for easy mobility.  Also look for electric cords or clutter on the floor.

As with all areas of the house, check to see how much wattage can be accommodated by fixtures, and maximize the light while also minimizing the shadows...

I promised in my last posting to talk more specifically about what can be made safe for seniors who wish to age in place – room by room.  I am going to start with the room in the home where most accidents happen, the bath.  The bathroom for most elders represents the perfect storm of a confined space with potentially slippery surfaces.  Nearly one-third of seniors over age 65 fall each year, and the majority of these falls happen in the bathroom.  With basic planning and potentially some retrofitting, however, the bath can be made more safe and accommodating to an older person’s limited mobility and range of motion.  Let’s start with surfaces.

There may already be a rug near the shower or bath area, but make certain it has a sticky, non-slip back to minimize falls when an elder enters or leaves the tub.  If your older loved one uses a floor mat in the tub area when showering, make sure that the suction cups still offer good sticking poser.  You may consider adhesive decals that stick to the porcelain tub...