Elderly at Risk in Extreme Cold

The extreme temperatures and snow of winter can be particularly dangerous for older adults. The elderly and those with heart disease are at special risk, according to the American Heart Association.

As people age, their ability to maintain a normal internal body temperature often decreases. Because elderly people seem to be relatively insensitive to moderately cold conditions, they can suffer hypothermia without knowing they're in danger, the Heart Association reports (http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=4570).

Hypothermia means the body temperature has fallen below normal. It occurs when your body can't produce enough energy to keep the internal body temperature warm enough and the condition can kill. Heart failure causes most deaths in hypothermia, the American Heart Association notes. 

 The following tips, from the local Home Instead Senior Care^® office, will help you safeguard a senior loved one or neighbor.

• Fill the cupboard. Help your senior stock the staples and groceries they’ll need in the event of a large snowstorm or cold spell.
• Maximize energy. Encourage your senior to make sure they have adequate insulation and to check and clean the fireplace and furnace. Replace furnace filters monthly.
• Minimize drafts. Help your senior fill old socks with sand and use them in drafty windowsills and door jams. Weather-strip around windows and doors. Keep doors closed to unused rooms and close curtains at night.
• Stay toasty. Advise your senior to add an extra blanket to the bed and warm the bed in advance with a hot water bottle. Never use electric blankets.  A senior may not be able to operate the controls if the temperature needs to be adjusted in the night.
• Dress warmly. A senior’s circulation decreases with age. Encourage your senior to wear an extra sweater or sweatshirt, and sweat pants during the winter.
• Monitor the thermostat. Check with your senior to make sure that they’re keeping the thermostat above 65 degrees during the cold weather. Older adults are particularly susceptible to hypothermia, which can develop over a few days and weeks even in the mildly cool indoor temperatures of 60 to 65 degrees.
• Beware of budget problems. Make sure your senior isn’t trying to save money by keeping the thermostat down. Many communities have energy assistance programs for low- and fixed-income households.

• Avoid slips. Make sure your senior has made arrangements to have driveways and walkways cleaned. Salt and sand should be available to speed melting.
• Stay in touch. Check on your neighbor or loved one frequently during periods of cold and snowy weather.
• Build a network. You can’t always be around to help your elderly loved one. Call on neighbors, family and church members to help.

For more information about the cold, visit the National Weather Service Web site at http://www.noaa.gov and the Federal Emergency Management Agency Web site at www.fema.gov. Or, to learn more about Home Instead Senior Care, log on to www.HomeInstead.com/nepa.

A Day in the Life of a Caregiver

Meet Reta
Reta lives in a small, 24-bed home specifically dedicated for individuals with Alzheimer’s disease or other dementias. She has lived there for four years. The home caters to individuals in the first and second stages of Alzheimer’s disease. Reta’s disease has progressed to Alzheimer’s stage three.

A Need for More Care
“The need for extra care became very evident when some challenging behaviors developed,” explained Sharon Galway, owner of the Home Instead Senior Care® franchise in northern Toronto. Reta began refusing bathing and personal care, was often anxious and agitated, and refused food during mealtimes. Though the facility staff were well trained in Alzheimer’s care, Reta’s disease had progressed to a stage that the staff was unable to effectively manage. Typically, this particular home does not permit patients to stay once they have entered stage three Alzheimer’s. However, due to long waiting lists for other facilities that could accept Reta, the home allowed Sharon and her team of CAREGiversSM to step in and help. 

Capturing Life’s Journey
Capturing Life’s Journey® is an Alzheimer’s care technique taught in the Home Instead Senior Care network’s Alzheimer’s or Other Dementias CARE: Changing Aging Through Research and Education® program. It’s a method of better understanding an individual by learning about his or her life history and past experiences, and using that knowledge to customize care accordingly. Before Sharon and her team began providing care to Reta, they gathered information from the home’s staff, talked to Reta’s family, and learned what they could about her past. 

One of the biggest difficulties the home staff expressed was getting Reta to shower. Sharon and her team learned that she had never liked showers or water. They also learned she was a very particular woman and very organized. In her current stage of Alzheimer’s, she would get up early and get dressed thinking it was time to go to work. Then she grew agitated when a staff member from the home wanted her to undress for the shower. That agitation carried through to other activities throughout the day. 

Creating a Customized Care Solution
Once Sharon’s team had identified a trigger for her behavior, they came up with a plan. If they got to Reta’s room before she got out of bed and got dressed, they could redirect her behavior. So Sharon found CAREGivers who were willing to get there at 6:30 in the morning. They started slow to gain her trust. For the first few weeks they were able to do a sponge bath. After six weeks, they could see a noticeable improvement in her behavior. Now a CAREGiver is able to manage her personal care, bathing and dressing, in addition to helping her transition to group activities for the day, all within a three-hour shift. Reta no longer exhibits any of the challenging behaviors she had before the Home Instead Senior Care team began providing her with specialized one-on-one care. 

A Better Quality of Life
The additional care support Home Instead CAREGivers provided Reta took away a lot of worry for her daughter, Linda. When Linda visited, she could be a daughter again. It also made a noticeable impact on Reta. Linda said, “I can tell you without a doubt that having the specialized care added to the quality of her life.”

Volunteers needed to help make holidays merry for local seniors - News - The Times-Tribune

BY COLLEEN DAY (STAFF WRITER)
Published: November 11, 2013

A local group is looking for some help to make the holidays merry for lonely seniors.

The Be a Santa to a Senior program, sponsored by Home Instead Senior Care, collects, wraps and delivers Christmas presents to senior citizens who might be overlooked during the holidays.

Home Instead Senior Care teamed up with other local groups, including Meals on Wheels, Serving Seniors, Compassionate Care Hospice and Oakwood Terrace, to identify financially needy or isolated seniors. The program also receives support from Geisinger Community Medical Center, Gertrude Hawk Chocolates and Keystone College.

Christmas trees featuring paper ornaments with seniors' first names and their gift requests will be set up today in locations throughout the county, including the Abington Community Library, GCMC, the Carbondale Peebles and the Wal-Mart and Marshalls in Dickson City.

Shoppers can pick up a paper ornament, buy the requested gift and return the unwrapped present, with the ornament attached, to the participating location. Gifts will be collected through Dec. 9.

Terry Wise, associate professor of sports management at Keystone College, said the college became involved in the program several years ago when a student worked with Home Instead Senior Care for her senior project.

"She loved the program, but she said that what was holding it back was that they had no place to wrap all of the presents they collect," Ms. Wise said. "She wanted to bring the program on campus."

Keystone College now supports the program by giving volunteers a place to wrap the presents. This year's gift wrap party is scheduled Dec. 10 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

"It's important that students are involved in the community. They need to give back and know that everyone is not as fortunate as they are," Ms. Wise said. "It's important for them to look outside of the microcosm of the college, see what's going on their community and get involved."

Jessica Engel, marketing and sales manager at Home Instead Senior Care and Be a Santa to a Senior coordinator, said the program began about 10 years ago as a way to ensure senior citizens do not spend the holiday season alone.

"People of all ages love the holidays," Ms. Engel said. "The gift is in the present, but it's also in having that connection and interaction with someone else. That is the gift for them. We have so many seniors in this area, and many of them are isolated."

Last year the program reached out to more than 800 seniors and ended up with about double that in presents.

"Everyone always gets a present. No senior on our list ever goes without. What we see is a lot of people buy not only what is on the ornament, but also a little something extra," Ms. Engel said

For more information on the program, visit BeaSantatoaSenior.com or call 570-687-4755.

Contact the writer: cday@timesshamrock.com

Volunteers needed to help make holidays merry for local seniors - News - The Times-Tribune

Increase in use of meal delivery programs could reduce LTC facility admissions

October 14, 2013 by Lois A. Bowers, Senior Editor of Long Term Living

Long-term care facilities could see fewer new residents, but states could save money by expanding meal-delivery programs that enable some seniors to stay in their homes longer or avoid moving altogether, according to a new study by Brown University investigators.
The public health researchers analyzed state, Medicaid and nursing home data to project that if each of the contiguous states expanded by one percent the percentage of senior citizens receiving delivered meals, then 1,722 more Medicaid recipients would avoid living in a long-term care facility. Twenty-six states would realize a net annual savings from expanding their programs, whereas 22 would end up spending more. In every state, however, more "low-needs" seniors would be able to remain in their homes regardless of whether their care is paid for by Medicaid.

Across the country, the one percent expansion would bring meals to 392,594 more seniors at a cost of more than $117 million, the researchers say. Because 1,722 seniors would no longer need to live in nursing homes on Medicaid, total Medicaid savings would total $109 million, they add. The additional food delivery costs outstrip Medicaid savings nationwide, even though most states would save money on a net basis, because in some very large states with relatively few low-care seniors or relatively low Medicaid per diems, food costs outweighed the resulting Medicaid savings on a relatively large scale.

Study lead author Kali Thomas, PhD, assistant professor in Brown’s School of Public Health, said the findings provide guidance for state policymakers as they consider the future of their home-delivered meals programs, which are conducted under the Older Americans Act. States projected to lose money can opt to focus their efforts in ways that are more precise than an across-the-board expansion, she adds.

“We’re not proposing that all states simply increase the proportion of age-65-plus receiving meals by one percent,” Thomas says. “But if they were to target these vulnerable people who are at risk for nursing home placement, they would likely see more savings. This is a program that has the potential to save states a lot of money if it’s done correctly.”
Policymakers should consider not only the fiscal implications of providing home-delivered meals, which the study quantifies, but also the impact on individual seniors, says Thomas, who adds that she has seen the benefits anecdotally as a Meals on Wheels volunteer in Rhode Island.

The National Institute on Aging and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality funded the research, which is published in the October issue of Health Affairs.

Living with Alzheimer’s: A Journey of Caring

As part of World Alzheimer’s Month, Home Instead Senior Care and Alzheimer’s Disease International (ADI) will co-host three roundtable events around the world to address the need for support for family members who care for those with Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias.

Roger Baumgart, Jeff Huber and Dave Banark will be representing Home Instead Senior Care at these events called Living with Alzheimer’s: A Journey of Caring in Washington D.C (Sept. 19), London (Sept. 20), and Beijing (Sept. 26).

Each panel of prestigious Alzheimer’s experts – including influential healthcare professionals, nonprofit organizations, government officials, opinion leaders and family caregivers – will be moderated by noted international journalists.  We encourage you to follow the discussion on Twitter and Facebook using #Alztalk2013.

The events will be moderated by:

o   Barry Petersen, Emmy Award-wining CBS Correspondent, Author of Jan’s Story about his late wife’s struggle with Alzheimer’s (North America)

o   Fergus Walsh, BBC Medical Correspondent (Europe)

o   Professor  Luning Wang, President, Alzheimer’s Disease China (Asia)

Panel members for the Living with Alzheimer’s: A Journey of Caring event include:

o   Marc Wortmann, Executive Director, Alzheimer’s Disease International

o   George Vradenburg, Chairman of USAgainstAlzheimer's

o   Dr. Robert Yeoh, former president Alzheimer’s Australia

o   Professor Angela Leung, Hong Kong University

o   Dr. David Saucedo, esteemed Alzheimer’s physician/researcher in Mexico

o   Dr. David Hilfiker, retired physician with Alzheimer’s, blogger recently featured in Mashable

o   Linda Lawrence, family caregiver from Canada

o    Dr. Alexander Sandy Halperin, Alumni Member of the National Alzheimer's Association Early Stage Advisory Group --- Alzheimer's Advocate; former dentist with Alzheimer’s

o    Karen Garner, Blogger, caregiver to husband with Younger Onset Alzheimer’s

o    Deb Cohen, Ph.D., Senior Vice President, Knowledge Development for the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM)

o    Anne Connelly, Aging Well Network in Ireland

o    Dr.  Hans Groth, World Demographic & Ageing Forum

o    Professor Martin Prince, King’s College

Older Adults Willing to Change Lifestyle to Avoid Fracture

A new study has found that older patients who know they are at risk of fractures will make positive lifestyle changes to avoid them, such as exercising, wearing proper footwear and taking supplements.

The findings are important, according to Dr. Joanna Sale, a researcher at St. Michael's Hospital, Toronto, and lead author of the study. She says much previous research in bone health has focused on medications or found that people make negative lifestyle changes such as reducing housework or leisure activities because they are afraid of falling.

Half of all women over the age of 50 and one in five men over 50 will have a fracture after falling from standing height or lower. Having one such fracture doubles a person's risk of having another. Dr. Sale, a clinical epidemiologist, said her research was aimed at finding ways to prevent those repeat fractures, particularly hip fractures, because about half of all hip fracture patients die or end up in long-term care facilities. Dr. Sale's study, published online in the journal Osteoporosis International, looked at patients over 65 who participated in the Osteoporosis Exemplary Care Program at St. Michael's Fracture Clinic.

Research participants were interviewed about their perceived fracture risk, recommendations they received about their bone health, results of bone density tests and any lifestyle or behavioral changes they made since their last fracture. Many said they didn't want to think about the possibility of a future fracture and felt they had little control over risk factors such as age – yet they all engaged in a number of daily behavioral strategies to manage their fracture risk. Most were concerned about being careful, such as using handrails or wearing proper shoes.

Faster Parkinson’s Detection Could Lead to Better Control

Parkinson’s disease is a neurological disorder that affects a half million people in the United States, with about 50,000 newly diagnosed cases each year. And, it normally strikes those past age 60.

Shaky hands, tremors, rigid muscles, slower movements are all the symptoms most often associated with Parkinson’s disease.

There is no cure and, until now, no reliable method for detecting the disease. An encouraging glimmer of hope exists, though. A research team from Michigan State has developed an innovative detection method they say is a major breakthrough in diagnosing Parkinson’s in early stages – the point at which treatment to control symptoms is most effective.

The method of detection, developed in part by Rahul Shrivastav, professor and chair of MSU’s Department of Communicative Sciences and Disorders, involves monitoring a patient’s speech patterns, specifically movement patterns of the tongue and jaw. Shrivastav says Parkinson’s affects all patients’ speech and changes in speech patterns are detectable before other movement and muscles are affected by the disease.

The new early detection method has proved to be more than 90 percent effective and is noninvasive and inexpensive. Requiring as little as two seconds of speech, monitoring can be done remotely and in telemedicine applications. Since there is no cure for Parkinson’s disease, early detection is particularly important because the treatments currently available for controlling symptoms are most effective at that stage.

Shrivastav hopes that by designing tools to capture those changes, which are very small, inaudible changes, neurologists and other health care providers will have a way to make a diagnostic decision that isn’t possible otherwise.

For more about this study, visit http://msutoday.msu.edu/360/2013/detecting-parkinsons-for-better-treatment/.