Geriatric Care Management Blog

With this posting, I am introducing a colleague and guest blogger, Pamela Holtzman, who is a therapist I know locally.  Pamela is an R.N and L.C.S.W. who combines her medical background with a combination of cognitive therapy, traumatic release with EMDR and EFT and integrative psychotherapy, to facilitate wholeness and wellness, in her clients. Her perspectives on being well while getting older are worth sharing:  “Have you had that birthday yet which made you suddenly realize that you really are getting older? I don’t mean older in a decrepit, breaking down way. I mean older in a wiser, stronger, and more mature way. I had discovered that I had reached that phase during my recent 60th birthday “initiation by storm” as I came face to face with IRENE, the Class 3 hurricane that wreaked havoc at the doorstep of our home in the Bahamas. What followed was a week-long power outage, and a chance to do a lot of soul searching. As...

    There are two fundamental laws regarding the places we call home, and these are no less true for older adults than they are for the rest of us.  One, we accumulate stuff.  Two, we tend to keep home the way it has always been.       The Stuff We Accumulate.  A lot of what makes it great to visit mom or dad is all the things that remind us of when we were younger and all lived together as a family.  But people have a way of hanging on to a lot of things over time, and not all of them are about memories.  The accumulated “stuff” can just become a lot of clutter or even pose a hazard to mom and dad.     Next time you visit mom or dad be aware of clutter.  Are newspapers, magazines and mail being regularly cleared or are they stacking up?  Are there boxes or piles of stuff gathering in the living spaces and walkways?  Even small piles of articles can pose trip hazards, especially if the areas are dimly lit.  Check all the pathways of the house for ready access or easy passage.  Check exits for boxes or...

It’s a subject I come back to frequently, because each year almost a million adults over age 65 are treated in hospital emergency rooms for injuries in their own homes.  Many of these injuries could have been prevented.  Just as you never wanted to get F’s in school, you do not want these two F’s in an older adult’s home.  These are preventable:  Falls and Fires.  If you are a caregiver to a senior living independently, please give this a read...and grade appropriately. FIRES:  Regarding fires, some of the places at home that would have been safe when a person was younger can become life-threatening hazards as one becomes older.  Older parents may be living in older homes and feeling some of the draft and cold that were never problems when they were younger, so they do the obvious.  They place space heaters in specific locations in the house where they may feel drafts and cold.  As a rule, that may not be a real problem.  But recall from some of my earlier postings that older adults are not as nimble on their feet and stray cords or the heaters themselves may be obstacles as they move from room to room.  ...

For those of you with a loved one who suffers from dementia of any sort, it is hard to see them fade in their ability to remember familiar surroundings, important experiences from the past or even remember you.  And as if that is not enough to manage as a caregiver, your loved one may also at times become inexplicably angry or aggressive.  So what can you do when dementia becomes violent? It is really critical that you always remember that the dementia is not about you, and it is not even really about the parent who once walked you to school, or down the aisle if you are married, or any of the countless other wonderful episodes in your collective life.  It is about the dementia and you cannot reason with it.   The Alzheimer’s Association, an organization founded to provide optimal care and services to individuals confronting dementia, and to their caregivers and families, offers some very helpful advice.  When you are with a person suffering from dementia, and they become aggressive...