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Tag: Elderly Care in Summerlin NV

Use National Anti-Boredom Month to Explore New Outdoor Activities

Posted on by Craig Bass

July was chosen as National Anti-Boredom Month because it’s the time of year when kids are out of school and starting to miss their friends. Boredom isn’t just for kids. When it gets hot outside, you may hear your parents complain about being stuck inside. What can you do?

During summer’s heat, you may not be able to get outside as much, but that doesn’t mean you have to stay trapped inside all of the time. Here are some of the outdoor activities that help your parents avoid feeling bored while also staying cool.

Fish for Fun or Food

Invest in some fishing poles and head to the nearest fishing hole. Your parents can keep what they catch and have fresh fish for dinner. Or, they could catch and release if they’re not interested in eating fish. You might want to see if fishing charters nearby can take your parents out onto the lake or ocean. That enables them to try to catch fish they don’t see as often.

Go Swimming or Soak in a Pool

Elderly Care in Summerlin NV
Elderly Care in Summerlin NV

Swimming pools aren’t as expensive as they were in the past. An inflatable ring pool is a suitable solution to summer’s heat. You don’t have to purchase a big one either. Get a small pool, fill it with water and soak in that on a hot summer’s day.

If you have a full-size pool or live near a public pool, take advantage of it. Your parents get plenty of exercise swimming laps. If they prefer, they can walk laps and use the resistance of the water to help them work out their leg muscles.

Photograph Nature

Grab a camera and head into the forest. The shade of the trees keeps you cooler, and your parents can get photos of nature along the way. If they don’t want to go into the forest, look for other scenic areas like rivers with waterfalls, lakes, and public gardens.

Play Water Volleyball

Head to a lake or ocean cove where the water is waist-deep and play water volleyball. You can get inflatable nets and an inflatable beach ball to make it easy to bring with you. The benefit to the water is you stay cool, and falling doesn’t hurt.

In between your visits, who helps your parents with daily activities? Call a home care agency and look into elderly care providers. Caregivers assist their elderly clients with housework, meals, transportation, laundry, medication reminders, and so much more. With elderly care aides helping them, your parents are able to age at home independently and safely.

If you are considering elderly care in Summerlin, NV for an aging loved one, please contact the caring staff at Golden Heart Senior Care of Summerlin. 702-800-4616.

Why Is Deep Vein Thrombosis Such a Serious Threat?

Posted on by Craig Bass
Elderly Care in Summerlin NV

March is Deep Vein Thrombosis Month, which makes it a good time to learn a little more about DVT and how it can impact your senior’s life. DVT is a serious condition that can become emergent very quickly. DVT involves blood clots forming in the deeper veins of your senior’s body, typically in the legs. Those blood clots can break free, wreaking havoc throughout the body. Learn more about DVT and how it affects your senior, as well as how elderly care can help.

DVT Can Lead to Pulmonary Embolism

Pulmonary embolisms, or PE, can occur when a clot or a small piece of a clot breaks off from the DVT and travel through your senior’s blood vessels and into the lungs. Large enough clots can block blood flow, which can be a fatal situation. This is the equivalent of a stroke in your senior’s brain. An elderly care provider can be with your senior when you can’t, making it possible for them to spot the signs of a stroke earlier than if they were alone.

DVT and PE Can Also Cause Heart Failure

A pulmonary embolism can also cause blood flow to and from the heart to stop or to slow down dramatically, especially when the pulmonary arteries are clogged. As the heart works harder to try to get that blood flowing, damage is created, even possibly a heart attack. The damage afterward, even with a mild pulmonary embolism, can dramatically shorten your senior’s life.

Post-thrombotic Syndrome and Elderly Care

Post-thrombotic syndrome happens during or after a DVT. Your senior might experience chronic swelling and pain in her leg. The swelling impedes blood flow, which creates serious issues in terms of keeping her extremities healthy. Skin can start to break down and the worst-case scenario can include amputation. Elderly care services can assist your senior following a hospital stay for DVT.

Preventing DVT Is Vital for Health

Preventing deep vein thrombosis is crucial for your senior’s overall health. If she’s been on bed rest or is not as mobile as she used to be, moving more can help. It’s important that she avoid crossing her legs or doing other things that can block blood flow in the legs. Other issues can contribute to DVT, such as being overweight and smoking. Talk to your senior’s doctor about her risk factors and about what she can do to prevent DVT.

Dealing with a DVT diagnosis can feel like a lot for your senior. It can help for her to have some hands-on assistance, both with tasks that have become more difficult and to assist with mobility concerns. Elderly care providers can take on that role for your senior, ensuring that she’s safe and has someone with her in case her situation changes.

IF YOU OR AN AGING LOVED ONE IS CONSIDERING ELDERLY CARE IN SUMMERLIN, NV, PLEASE CONTACT THE CARING STAFF AT GOLDEN HEART SENIOR CARE OF SUMMERLIN. 702-800-4616.

Bird Feeding to Build a Strong Bond Between Children and Their Grandparents

Posted on by Craig Bass

Facilitating a strong bond between your parents and your children is easier than you’d imagine. A loving relationship between generations helps with both mental and physical health. Bird feeding is an activity for all ages.

Not only will they find ways to bond, but it also benefits nature. It reduces stress and gets your parents up and out of the house. How do you do to get them started? How do you set up your parents’ yard to make bird feeding ideal?

Supplies You Need to Get Started

Birds can forage seeds and berries on their own, but it’s harder in a winter climate. To create the perfect backyard bird buffet, you want a few different feeders. A platform feeder is appreciated by larger birds, while smaller birds will happily eat from a tube feeder.

Add water in a heated birdbath if possible. A suet feeder will provide the fat that birds like woodpeckers crave. If you’re worried about squirrels, invest in a corn cob holder and place it nearby but away from the bird feeders. Squirrels will go for the corn if it’s available. Baffles can also help keep squirrels from reaching the bird feeders.

Types of Bird Seed

You’ll find that many birds are happy with sunflower seeds. The shell will biodegrade and become mulch in the lawn. If you don’t want waste, no-waste bird seed exists.

If you want to offer more food, look for mixes with dried berries. Some birds will also enjoy a platform feeder that has mealworms for protein.

As you see the types of birds that come to the feeders, you can adapt what seeds you buy. Woodpeckers will go for suet. Goldfinches love sunflower and thistle seeds. Cardinals enjoy safflower seeds. As spring arrives, you can attract orioles with half sections of oranges or grape jelly. Hummingbirds love nectar.

A Few Things to Consider

In areas where bears are common, place your feeders high up on a roofline where there’s no way for bears to reach it. You could install a pulley-system laundry line from a tree to an upstairs window. Place the feeders on that and refill the feeders as needed from the open window.

If any of the people in your neighborhood allow their cats to go outside, cats are also a problem. If the bird feeders are well off the ground, it will be harder for cats to get to the birds.

Finally, put the feeders near trees and shrubs when possible. It gives the birds some cover when they feel the need to hide while they eat the seed they just picked from the feeder.

Spend as much time as you can with your parents. When you can’t be there to help them out, make sure they have elderly care aides to assist them with daily activities. Elderly care providers can help them with laundry, housekeeping, transportation, and more. Call today to find out how elderly care can help your senior loved one.

IF YOU OR AN AGING LOVED ONE IS CONSIDERING ELDERLY CARE IN SUMMERLIN, NV, PLEASE CONTACT THE CARING STAFF AT GOLDEN HEART SENIOR CARE OF SUMMERLIN. 702-800-4616.

Helping your Parent live with COPD

Posted on by Craig Bass

COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease) is a common illness for senior citizens. COPD is characterized by persistent airflow limitation that is usually gets worse over time, causing the lungs to get inflamed as they respond to the presence of noxious particles or gases in the airways and lungs. COPD is most often brought on by years of smoking or exposure to toxic air chemicals. Symptoms include a chronic cough, labored breathing and an excess amount of phlegm that needs to be expelled from the lungs.

If your parent has been diagnosed with COPD, you might be looking at how you can make her home as safe and healthy as possible for her. COPD can be managed and those diagnosed with it can still live in the home but as a caregiver for an aging parent either living alone or with her partner, you may need to help her set up some new rules around the home to help her lungs stay clear and manageable.

No Smoking Zone

If your parent is a smoker, now is the time to finally have her stop smoking. Smoking will only continue to make her condition worse causing her lungs to get more inflamed and not be able to function properly. If your parent diagnosed with COPD lives with another person who smokes, that person will have to stop smoking in the home. Second-hand smoke can also do harm to your parent’s lungs. Any visitors should not be allowed to smoke in the home as well. Have yourself or your elderly care provider create a sign that goes on the front door explaining that no smoking is allowed. This will help your parent not have to be so confrontational with visitors.

Maintain Good Air Quality Inside

In addition to not letting anyone smoke inside the home, eliminate all items that may create fumes or strong smells in the home. If your parent has enjoyed lighting incense or candles to perfume her home, that will need to be eliminated going forward. Also, ask guests to not wear heavy perfumes or colognes while visiting. Don’t forget to mention this request to your parent’s elderly care provider as well.

Stay Inside When Necessary

Depending on where you live, outside air quality may be an issue. There are apps or weather alerts to alert communities of poor air quality. You can help your elderly parent program one of these to alert her when the outside air quality is not safe for her to do outdoor activities. Having an elderly care provider hired to run errands or perform outside chores when the air quality is not ideal will give your parent the ability to stay inside when needed. Your parent will also want to make sure windows and doors are closed on days when the air quality is especially bad outside.

Visit the Doctor Regularly

Having your parent maintain a consistent visiting schedule with her doctor will help her and you manage her disease and stay on top of any developments that may come up. Put the appointments on your parent’s calendar and then make sure you have transportation lined up for your parent’s visit, whether that’s provided by you, your elderly care provider or someone else.
Encourage your parent to be proactive in how she manages her COPD going forward. It can be a difficult disease to live with but with the proper precautions and regulations, she’ll still be able to stay at home while living with COPD.

Source: https://www.todaysgeriatricmedicine.com/archive/031912p8.shtml

IF YOU OR AN AGING LOVED ONE IS CONSIDERING ELDERLY CARE IN SUMMERLIN, NV, PLEASE CONTACT THE CARING STAFF AT GOLDEN HEART SENIOR CARE OF SUMMERLIN. 702-800-4616.