Health and Disability

6. Get rid of firearms, or store them in a locked cabinet with bullets in a separate locked cabinet.
7. Install safety locks and alarms on exit doors and gates.
8. Cover smooth or shiny surfaces to reduce confusing glare.
9. Eliminate shadows with a lamp that reflects off the ceiling.
10. Cover or remove mirrors if they are upsetting to a person with hallucinations.
11. Store car keys in a locked container; disable the car.
12. Do not allow unattended smoking.
13. Make sure an I.D. bracelet is being worn at all times.
14. When selecting home care, make sure to hire an aide who has been trained to deal with dementia and Alzheimer’s patients, and is under the supervision of a skilled home care nurse.
15. And, most importantly, constantly re-assess your parent’s abilities with the help of a nurse or physician.......

http://bit.ly/c2AAIa

http://bit.ly/bN5CcW

 http://bit.ly/9OtJIn

http://bit.ly/bsBJC9

One had to look closely, but the white sneaker definitely tapped the floor.

Slightly, softly, steadily. Like a heartbeat.

“What does the music remind you of, Marsha?” the caregiver at Villa Ventura in south Kansas City asked loud enough to be heard above the headphones.

The woman looked up, a bit puzzled at first, then: “Being alive.”

Read more: http://www.kansascity.com/2010/06/14/2017763/experts-look-to-music-as-way-to.html#ixzz0sQKTVLXz

So many questions.

The New Old Age has been following the Class Act, the first national plan for long-term care insurance, since last summer, but the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy and his staff began working on the current version of this plan in 2003. It was tucked into the Democrats’ health care legislation and thus, without much public attention, became law last month. Call it Mr. Kennedy’s final bequest.

The program underwent a number of changes during the health care debate, so some early projections are now out of date. And many of the details we most want to know have yet to be established by the secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius, who is going to be one busy woman for the next couple of years.

But we do know the plan’s basic outlines, so I’ll try to respond to some of the many questions readers raised the last time we talked about this.

Mary Wareheim suffers from a long list of health problems. She’s an amputee who uses a wheelchair. She has diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure and an irregular heartbeat; she takes 11 prescription drugs. At 83, she leaves home infrequently, perhaps twice a year.

Yet she’s been the hospital just once in six years, probably because she’s had excellent medical care and monitoring. Though she’s essentially homebound, doctors come to her, in the Baltimore house she shares with her daughter, son-in-law and a Great Dane named Murphy, through the Johns Hopkins Elder House Call Program.

http://nyti.ms/cxHQjB

....Let’s put the seniors in jail, and the criminals in a nursing home.

This way the seniors would have access to showers, hobbies,
and walks, they’d receive unlimited free prescriptions, dental
and medical treatment, wheel chairs etc. and they’d receive money instead of
paying it out.

They would have constant video monitoring, so they could be
helped instantly, if they fell, or needed assistance.

Bedding would be washed twice a week, and all clothing would be
ironed and returned to them.

A guard would check on them every 20 minutes, and bring their meals
and snacks to their cell. They would have family visits in a suite built for that
purpose.

They would have access to a library, weight room, spiritual counseling, pool,
and education......

http://bit.ly/aJULA0