Alzheimer’s

Thursday, January 31, 2019
4:00 – 7:00 pm
Valley Memorial Park – Novato
650 Bugeia Lane (off Atherton Ave.)
FREE EVENT!

Learn tips on how in-home respite care can help you steer clear of caregiver burnout.

Providing care for an older loved one, in spite of being incredibly rewarding, can also include a high level of caregiver stress. The full-time responsibility of meeting a loved one’s needs can quickly escalate to caregiver burnout – a dangerous condition which can cause loss of patience and emotional outbursts. This has an impact on not only the caregiver herself, but on her senior loved one as well.

It’s crucial to discover if you might be in danger of developing caregiver burnout, and seek assistance if needed. The questionnaire below from Hired Hands Homecare, experts at in home care in Walnut Creek and surrounding areas, can help you determine if you might have crossed the line from caregiver stress to caregiver burnout:

Do you … Read More »

Greetings! Join us today, Oct. 24 from 9am – 3pm at the Marin Senior Information Fair.  There’ll be tons of great information for and about Seniors.  Get your Flu vaccine, and make sure you stop by the Hired Hands Homecare booth to say hello to Blake and Kirsten.  We’d love to answer any questions you may have about how we can help families and their senior loved ones!

Hired Hands Homecare is proud to celebrate 25 years of participation in the Marin Senior Information Fair, and supporting the seniors and families of Marin County.

For more information about the Marin Senior Info Fair, please visit https://marinseniorfair.org.

Learn how to best respond to challenging Alzheimer’s behaviors.

Alzheimer’s disease often presents complex issues for both the person diagnosed and his or her loved ones. As the disease progresses, challenging Alzheimer’s behaviors often manifest, as seniors increasingly express their needs through actions instead of language, and these behaviors can often be inappropriate in nature. For instance, seniors with more advanced Alzheimer’s disease may display the following:

Agitation and aggression
Inappropriate sexual behavior such as:

Taking off clothing or touching themselves in public
Using obscene language
Accusations that a spouse is having an affair

Hallucinations
Depression

Behaviors such as these can be embarrassing and troubling for Alzheimer’s caregivers, but they can also be extremely confusing and frustrating for the person with Alzheimer’s, who most likely cannot understand why the behavior is inappropriate or upsetting to others.

As an Alzheimer’s caregiver, it’s essential to keep in mind that any … Read More »

Learn ways to ease stress when providing Alzheimer’s care for a loved one.

Some of the busiest people working today are providing Alzheimer’s care for a senior loved one, but that’s not all. Although Alzheimer’s caregivers have their hands full with that role alone, many also work long hours at full-time jobs, shuttle the kids to school and other activities, run errands and take care of the home, and prepare dinner for the family on top of their caregiving duties. When do they have time to just relax? When providing Alzheimer’s care, it can often feel like your day never ends, and stress and poor sleep can wear down your body as well as your mind. Caregiver burnout is a real and serious condition that can result in, among other things, physical health problems, depression, feelings of being isolated, … Read More »

Our Santa Rosa, CA in-home care specialists share information on Alzheimer’s disease.

Facing the challenges of Alzheimer’s disease in a senior loved one raises a multitude of questions: Is it truly Alzheimer’s, or could it be another type of dementia? What’s the cause of Alzheimer’s? What treatment possibilities are there? And how is it diagnosed, anyway? With our comprehensive experience in caring for those who have Alzheimer’s, Hired Hands Homecare’s Santa Rosa, CA in-home care team has collected responses to some of the most frequent questions we receive:

What causes Alzheimer’s disease?
Researchers don’t yet fully realize what causes Alzheimer’s disease. However, chronic diseases, such as heart disease and diabetes, diet, exercise, and social engagement may possibly have an effect on whether or not an individual develops Alzheimer’s.
What’s the difference between Alzheimer’s disease and dementia?
Dementia is the symptom and … Read More »

Learn how to better communicate with a person with Alzheimer’s disease.

Alzheimer’s disease and other types of dementia have a strong influence on language. The disease has an effect on speech and making use of words, as well as the comprehension of words. As the disease advances, language as a method of connecting will become less effective, and family and friends may need to choose different methods for communicating to interact with their loved one.

Hired Hands Homecare, top providers of the professional elderly care Santa Rosa families need, offers the following tips to help in communication and understanding with a loved one with dementia:

Make sure to use a kind tone – slower, lower, smiling.
Always treat the individual as an adult with the utmost respect, and make your best effort to be patient, flexible, supportive and calm.
Be sure there are … Read More »

The home care experts at Hired Hands outline simple exercises to improve senior safety.

The CDC reports that as many as one-third of all seniors fall each year, and surprisingly, less than half of those seniors talk to their doctors about it. When a senior experiences a fall, even if it does not cause serious injury, she can develop a heightened fear of falling, which may result in limited activities, reduced mobility, loss of physical fitness, and in turn, an increased risk of falling again.

In our last blog post, we discussed some home modifications you can make to improve senior safety and reduce the risk of falls. In addition, there are a number of exercises that seniors can do on a regular basis to increase muscle strength and improve balance, which will not only help reduce … Read More »

Hired Hands Homecare shares details on how to keep seniors safe from falls.

You may have at one time been by a senior loved one’s side at the hospital or doctor’s office and noticed the medical worker attaching a colorful “FALL RISK” band to his or her wrist. Notifying those providing care to this possibility allows additional measures to keep seniors safe during medical treatments. However, did you realize that ongoing, everyday life can pose a fall risk danger to those diagnosed with the following conditions?

Arthritis

Osteoporosis, a bone density disorder that can also increase a person’s chances of fracturing a hip

Vertigo

Cerebrovascular insufficiency

Neurologic disability (stroke)

Postural hypotension (sudden decrease in blood pressure)

Diabetes

Read More »

Search online for “activities for seniors” and you’re likely to find numerous crafts, games, memory stimulation puzzles, and of course, the requisite bingo. However, what you won’t discover—unless you dig a little deeper with your searches—are the meaningful, beneficial activities that give significance to our lives. And yet, if you ask older individuals what they most want to do, the majority of them won’t mention bingo, crafts and games. What they want more than anything is to feel useful.

The University of Minnesota reveals details on how the most vulnerable times in our lives are a person’s first year of life, and our first year after retiring. The loss of the sense of purpose found in a fulfilling profession can cause significant health issues – and even an earlier fatality rate, if that awareness of purpose is not maintained … Read More »