When is it time for a senior to give up the keys to the car?  Very often, driving remains an act of independence that many seniors are reluctant to part with.  At times, and as difficult as it may be, it is incumbent for adult children to step in.

The signs that your elderly loved one needs to give up driving:

1. Sudden lane changes, braking, or acceleration for no particular reason — a sign that their reflexes are slowing
2. Lots of near-collisions or small, minor accidents, such as scraping their car against another car or a garage.
3. Failing to use the turn signal
4. Driving on the wrong side of the road or in the shoulder
5. An inability to read road signs or written directions
6. Missing turns or backing up to make the correct turn
7. Inability to judge a specific distance
8. Misidentifying the gas pedal for the brake and vice versa
9. Lots of fidgeting while driving
10. Lack of patience while driving and arguing with other drivers
11. Making wrong turns and not being able to remember how to get to often-traveled places
12. Confusion at traffic lights (e.g. mistaking red for green and vice versa)
13. Repeatedly being pulled over by police officers

If you notice any of these problems on a regular basis, it is time to step in.  It is not something that should be put off.

New Jersey’s Expert Home Care provides professional and reliable care and assistance for NJ seniors, helping them manage their daily living activities since 1984. We’ve helped many families overcome the problem of unsafe senior driving. Please call us when you need help at 800-848-2336.

Posted by: Frank Esposito, Vice President of Expert Home Care

Without wheels

“Many people can drive safely through their later years. As a group, older drivers are typically safe drivers. Drivers age 64 and older represent 14 percent of the driving population but just 8 percent of vehicular accidents,“ says Maureen Mohyde, director of Corporate Gerontology at The Hartford, and co-author of “We Need to Talk: Family Conversations with Older Drivers.”

About two-thirds of older drivers self-regulate or voluntarily restrict their driving to avoid night driving, slippery road conditions, rush hour or other difficult driving conditions, she adds.

As a concerned family member, relative or friend, it’s good to be proactive. There are positive things you can do to reduce driving risks and auto fatalities. The first step is to start talking about the subject before it becomes an issue.

You can broach the subject a number of ways. Talk about heavy traffic or road construction. Bring up news reports of an auto accident or announcement of a new senior transportation service. Deteriorating health, new medications or a recent fender-bender clearly mean it’s time to talk.

For help getting started, check out the free 24-page “ We Need to Talk: Family Conversations with Older Drivers,” produced by The Hartford in cooperation with the MIT Age Lab. The guide and video are available at: http://www.thehartford.com/talkwitholderdrivers/.

Key to any decision-making is driving  frequently enough with your elderly parent, relative, friend or client to know if they should still get behind the wheel. Some problems to watch for include: riding the break, hitting curbs, failure to stop at stop signs, running a red light, getting lost or confusing the gas and break pedals.

Finally, start investigating the options so that you can come to the table with transportation alternatives. Family members, friends, public transportation, taxis, senior services programs, non-profit organizations and churches offer a variety of ways to get around.

Most important of all, when it’s time to stop driving, be sure to let your loved one know they are only giving up their keys, not their lives.

Caregiving responsibilities can get in the way of family relationships because new roles are formed; stresses may cause strain in family and bonds between caregivers and their care recipients may feel clinical. Whether it is a spouse providing care for their elder partner or an adult child providing care for a parent, families need to make the effort to maintain ties that do not relate to care duties.

The following methods will help caregivers maintain strong bonds with their care recipients that stem beyond their responsibilities as a provider.

• Sit down and look over family photos and reminisce about past memories
• Get together with other members of the family regularly
• Make time for activities that you once enjoyed together
• Discuss your relationship regularly, and do not hesitate to voice any concerns
• Continue to offer your care recipient as much independence as possible, you are there to help them with their care, but don’t want to make them feel like you are interfering in their life
• Maintain intimacy with your spouse or partner
• Don’t remain in a relationship that has survived out of obligation
• If the care structure is creating too much tension, step back and allow another relative, friend, or professional to take over
Source: http://arthritis.about.com/cs/sex/a/sicknesshealth.htm

Continuing our post from August 22.. Sibling Conflict in Elder Care

Resolving these conflicts can be challenging. But ignoring the difficulties in a caregiving situation can create greater challenges. Ultimately, strained family relationships can impede a family’s capacity to provide the greatest quality of care to a parent. How can families come together in caregiving?

Here are some suggestions:

• Express your feelings honestly and directly. Let your siblings know their help is both wanted and needed.
  Keep family members informed regarding a parent’s condition.
• Be realistic in your expectations. Allow siblings to help in ways they are able and divide tasks according to individual abilities, current life pressures and personal freedoms. Assistance with errands, finances, legal work or other indirect care may be the best option for some family members.
• Express appreciation to your family for help they are able to provide.
• Accept siblings for who they are and expect differences of opinion.
• Try to respect other’s perceptions and find opportunities to compromise.
• If communication is particularly contentious, arrange a family meeting that includes an outside facilitator, such as your FCA Family Consultant, social worker, counselor, religious leader or friend. A trusted outside party can ensure that everyone’s voice is heard.
• If siblings are unable to help with care, seek other assistance to provide a respite for yourself.
• Call your local Caregiver Resource Center, Area Agency on Aging, Senior Center or other community resource to locate help.
• Try to forgive family members who continue to refuse to get involved in a loved one’s care. The only thing we have control over in a situation is our reaction. Attempt to work through your negative emotions to take care of yourself and move forward.

http://www.caregiver.org/caregiver/jsp/content_node.jsp?nodeid=868

Caring for aging parents or ill relatives brings out the good and the bad in sibling and family relationships. Caregiving can be a time for siblings to come together and provide support for each other or it can be a time for stressful transition, causing strained connections and painful conflict.

A source of friction between adult children carries the existing legacy of family dynamics. Demands of caregiving bring up old patterns, unresolved issues, and tensions. Old family wounds are reopened and rivalries reemerge. Siblings can find themselves replaying their historical roles in the family, recreating old dynamics of competition and resentment as they vie for mom’s and/or dad’s attention and affection.

Other things arise such as denial over a parent’s condition. Siblings who are unable to accept the reality of a parent’s illness and refuse involvement may be protecting themselves from facing a parent’s eventual death and their own loss. This causes the active family caregivers to react with resentment, bitterness, and anger.

What is seen in families is that discord surfaces from the unequal division of caregiving duties. Usually, it is one adult child or sibling that carries the primary role of caregiving for mom or dad. This may be because he or she lives closest to a parent, is perceived as having less work or fewer family obligations, or is considered the “favorite” child. When this situation occurs, it can lead the overburdened primary caregiver feel frustrated and resentful and other siblings to feel uninformed and left out.

Go to http://www.caregiver.org/caregiver/jsp/content_node.jsp?nodeid=868

For help when caring for an aging relative at home go to Expert Home Care and call 800-848-2336.

In North America today, it is very common for children to provide full time care to their aging parents, often within their own homes. Adjusting to the arrival of a parent into a home can be both rewarding and burdening, and it is important that the caregiver receives both emotional and physical support from the rest of his/her family.

Unfortunately, caregiving for a parent is a situation that can often be a source of tension for siblings. It can be difficult for families to agree on the best methods of care, and is not uncommon for non caregiving family members to feel left out. In order to make the adjustment easier on the parent and caregiver, it’s crucial that non active siblings leave the major decisions to the caregiver while still being there for support. Siblings should respect decisions made by the caregiver and keep in mind the sacrifices that he/she has had to make in order to care for mom or dad.

Families need to stick together to provide for the well-being of their family unit, and maintain a peaceful and happy environment for their elder members.

In our last post, Expert Home Care listed tips and observations on determining if your loved one needs caregiving, or live-in caregiving. If you resolved that the senior has immediate needs, then it’s time to talk about it with the senior. This will be a delicate process that requires probing but respectful questions, a healthy dose of empathy, and an understanding that there will be communication problems and pitfalls.

You will either find that your loved one in question accepts their limitations and makes necessary adjustments, or they will resist and struggle. If he/she resist, know that your conversation may be interpreted as a personal threat to their independence. 

The most effective discussions focus on what seniors can do, rather than what they can’t do. Encourage them to make good use of the abilities they still have. When caregiving is needed, here are some steps to consider taking:

• Make a list of the assistance that is needed
• Identify potential helpers and tasks
• Establish a network of professional care providers
• Monitor and ensure quality service from care providers
• Avoid family caregiver burnout by maintaining balance and obtaining relief

The more you know about you mom or dad’s needs and desires, as well as knowing what is available to them through their community services and those related costs, the more depth you will add to discussions about caregiving.

Remember to call Expert Home Care at 800-848-2336, we are Certified Senior Advisors who understand and know the right kind of planning, recommendations and referrals to help make aging a state to be savored instead of a fate to be feared.

Frank Esposito and David Goodman, owners of Expert Home Care in NJ are Certified Senior Planners, members of the Society of Certified Senior Advisors. The Society works very hard educating professionals, like us, to work more effectively with our senior clients. We believe that the right kind of planning, recommendations and referrals can make aging a state to be savored instead of a fate to be feared. For us it means understanding the key health, social and financial factors that are important to seniors, and how these factors work together. 

To our families of aging seniors, knowing when the need for caregiving arises is key. Usually, it’s defined by functional ability, not by the age of your loved one. In our experience working with New Jersey seniors for the past 20+ years, most wish to remain independent. Seniors also wish to remain in control of their lives as long as possible. We’ve learned not to make generalizations when it comes to age. 

Determining if your NJ senior needs caregiving assistance will demand astute observation on the family member’s part. Also, you will need to ask revealing questions and pay attention to the telltale signs. It’s important to look for patterns of consistent neglect within the following:

• Basic tasks: difficult in walking, dressing, talking, eating, cooking, climbing steps, or managing medications
• Hygiene: infrequent bathing, unusually sloppy appearance, bad body/mouth odor
• Responsibilities: unopened mail, unpaid bills, unfilled prescriptions, unreadable checkbook, phone calls aren’t returned, low food supply, laundry is piled up, spoiled food in refrigerator
• Health: weight loss, appetite changes, difficulty swallowing, fatigue, burns, bruises, hearing loss, incontinence, spilling or dropping things (look for stains), sleeping too much or too little, dehydration
• Isolation: Lack of interest in friendships, hobbies, or activities; curtains drawn day and night, no access to transportation
• Attitude: sadness or talk of feelings of depression and despair, abuse of alcohol or drugs,  paranoia, refusal to communicate, unusual argumentativeness, verbal abuse
• Cognitive functions: consistent forgetfulness about where things are, getting lost walking or driving, confusion, loss of reasoning skills, difficulty answering questions, inability to find the right  word or complete a sentence, repetitive words or phrases, wandering, loss of sense of time or  season, forgetting how to use ordinary things like a pencil, consistently forgetting to turn off stove, close windows, or lock doors.

Pay attention to these signs – these are the telltale signs that give you information that you seek. Visit our next posting when we give tips on “how to bring up the home care help talk”.

If you need more help determining whether your loved one needs caregiving at home, please call us at 800-848-2336 or visit Expert Home Care New Jersey.

A healthy immune system is capable of eliminating dangerous infections and diseases before you’re even aware of them. Our body’s immune system is a thriving swarm of billions and billions of white blood cells, T-cells and other antibodies that have one goal: to recognize foreign invaders within our body and destroy them!

When bacteria enters your body through a cut, specialized cells called macrophages rush to the scene to devour the invaders. Other helper T-cells, killer T-cells and B-cells which create antibodies also rush to the site to clean up any bacterial fragments left behind.

Viruses are more insidious than bacterial infections because they sneak into our cells and have the ability to alter them for their own purposes. Against a viral infection, the immune system dispatches swarms of antibodies to attack the viral invaders. In addition, your immune system has memory cells that analyze each viral infection, remembers the formula that successfully defeated it, and creates an immunity to that exact virus in the future.

Lastly, our immune system contains free ranging agents called natural killer (NK) cells that seem to be programmed to attack both viruses and cancer cells. Fortunately, you can strengthen your immune system without too much effort:

• Eat a balanced diet.
• Cut down on fats.
• Take supplements containing the antioxidants like vitamins A, C, and E.
• Exercise regularly. Regular exercise increases blood flow and helps to move immune cells throughout your body.
• Minimize or neutralize the effects of stress. Chronic, unrelieved stress is probably the most severe threat to your body’s immune system.
• Limit alcohol consumption.
• Quit smoking cigarettes
• Get a good night’s sleep.

Without our immune system, even the mildest infection would be lethal. Under normal circumstances and with a little care and common sense, we can all keep our body’s immune system healthy and strong.

New Jersey’s Expert Home Care can help keep your aging relatives safe & healthy. Call us at 800-848-2336.

You are invited to listen to our host, Frank Esposito, interview Donald Vanarelli, Esq., certified elder law attorney and co-founder of the Elder Mediation Center of New Jersey. The topic of the radio interview is Elder Law Mediation (click to listen). Don Vanarelli explains the circumstances that make elder law mediation a viable option for resolving disputes between family members over care, finances, independence and other issues involving elderly parents.

What is elder mediation?

Mr. Vanarelli explains that mediation is primarily for family members to find resolution when helping aging parents become a topic of family dispute, “when family members are unable to hear one another and find resolution on hard elder care issues, mediation can help find agreement between family members,” says Don Vanarelli.

Some of those hard elder care issues are:

• Housing Issues
• Power of Attorney
• Guardianship
• Family caregiving – scheduling sibling’s time committments and responsibilities
• Finding in-home help for aging relative or parent
• Living arrangements
• Healthcare Issues & planning
• Estate Planning
• Finances
• Medical Treatments

It’s best to come to resolution before filing a lawsuit, going to court, and having the judge make decisions for the family. If you are in dispute over any of the issues listed above or maybe another hard elder care concern, you might consider going to a professional like an elder law attorney to get resolution before your family comes to an impasse. It’s always better to keep the lines of communication open, especially when seeking soltutions that are best for your mom and dad.

Donald Vanarelli, Esq., certified elder law attorney points out in the radio interview some of the benefits you, a family as a whole, receives from mediation:

• Siblings come together in the same room – this may be the first time in years if family siblings live in different states.
• You get to experience sibling’s body language and make eye contact
• You may also view your parent’s reactions, physical responses
• Walk away with problems resolved, next steps to take, and have specific, clear action items for each family member to do/take

Listen now and hear if family mediation is right for you: Elder Law Mediation.  Brought to you by Expert Home Care New Jersey, the leader in New Jersey elder & senior live-in home care.

Call us for senior live-in help today, 800-848-2336 or contact Expert Home Care New Jersey.