Does my loved one need help?

Home care services should be tailored to meet each person’s unique needs. When selecting home care services, the list below can assist in understanding a person’s behavior and help you determine the type of care needed, while still providing them with independence and dignity.

• Managing finances: Are bills being paid late or being forgotten altogether?
• Errands: Are running simple errands, such as grocery shopping, doctor appointments or a trip to pick up prescriptions at the pharmacy becoming a challenge?
• Post surgery: Managing even the simplest daily activities after coming home from the hospital after surgery can be a challenge.
• Memory loss/Dementia: A gradual or sudden loss of memory and language skills may result in evasive answers in an attempt to cover the inability to remember words, places and people.
• Diminished hearing: Your loved ones don’t always answer the phone or take a long time pick up when you call… even though they’d always answered with no problems before.
• Diminished sight: Is your loved one experiencing falls? Have you noticed a hesitance in his or her walk?
• Falls: Unexplained bruises, often accompanied by explanations for cuts, bruises or broken bones that don’t ring true.
• Incontinence: Clothing stains; odors emanating from furniture, clothing or automobile seats.
• Self neglect: Poor eating habits and inadequate nutrition/hydration; failure or inability to follow through on physician’s instructions, medicine dosages, etc.
• Won’t bathe: It could simply be that they are afraid or not able to get into the bath and are too embarrassed to ask for help.
• Resists doing things that he/she always liked: Such as playing cards, singing or dancing. This could be a sign of depression. Or a sign that the capability to do these activities is slipping. The inability to do what they used to do can trigger depression. 
• Won’t get out of bed: This could be a sign that they don’t feel well, but can also be a symptom of depression.
• Won’t take his/her medicine:They might be experiencing some side effects to a medication. Check with the doctor or a pharmacist as to what the possible side effects are of the medicine they are resisting and then check for these side effects. 
• Makes excuses not to attend family or other special events they used to enjoy: Investigate if there is something about the physical environment that bothers them – too much noise, harsh smells or whether the temperature is too hot or cold. 

Next: What type of assistance do we need?