The Caregiver Archives - Page 15 of 17

Caution with Medication for Alzheimer and Dementia Patients is a MUST

Caution with Medication for Alzheimer’s and dementia

There are so many behavioral issues with dementia that the list of powerful medications prescribed can become quite long.

Yet, not all medications for behavior problems has an affect on “wandering” or “restlessness” or “incontinence.” So more drugs are prescribed. And since most Alzheimer’s or Dementia sufferers are elderly, they often have other illnesses which require more medications.

And soon… the caregiver may be treating so many different conditions, only a registered nurse would not be confused.

Caution must always be taken by the caregiver in these circumstances. An overdose, or “reaction” between two conflicting medications can mean a catastrophic situation for the patient. A few precautions taken ahead of time, can prevent problems later.

First and foremost: If there is more than one physician involved with the patient, they should all be aware of medications prescribed by the other doctors.

All medications should be stored out of sight and never easily available to the patient, or children who enter the home.

Ideally, if all prescriptions are filled at the same pharmacy, your pharmacist may become a valued friend. He can assist in sorting and tracking the medications and double-check with each new prescription for drugs which interact. You might also find it helpful to keep a list of all the medications, along with any notes about each prescription.

Information to note about each prescription might include:

>How many doses per day–/Plus any special instructions per dose
>Should the medication be given with or without food/or water
>Which medications may interact
>What are symptoms of a “reaction” or overdose for each drug
>Which of the medications should NEVER be taken at the same time
>Do some foods need to be avoided for a particular medication

An overall list of symptoms that can occur from a “drug reaction” include:

Increased agitation
slow or stooped walk
falling
dizzy spells
drowsiness
incontinence
apathy
sleepiness
confusion
stiffness
or any new symptom or behavior that is out of the ordinary.

As you may have noticed, many of the symptoms of drug “inter reactions” are also general symptoms of Alzheimer’s and Dementia behavior. So more caution is needed. Don’t always assume that changed behavior is only a new symptom of Alzheimer’s or Dementia. If anything unusual occurs, or a behavior suddenly changes, contact the doctor or emergency room right away.

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During the Mild to Moderate stages of Alzheimer’s, drugs such as Razadyne® (galantamine), Exelon® (rivastigmine), and Aricept® (donepezil) are usually prescribed to delay and prevent symptoms from becoming worse. It is thought that these drugs may help some of the behavioral symptoms also.

Namenda® (memantine), an N-methyl D-aspartate (NMDA) antagonist are drugs prescribed to treat Moderate to Severe Alzheimer’s. These drugs are used to assist the patient in being able to maintain some daily functions a little longer, such as using the bathroom.

These types of drugs are begun in smaller doses and increased gradually. They demand constant monitoring for any sign of problems or side effects.

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There are other drugs which are used to control behavior or assist in sleeping, or altering mood, etc. Some are to be given “as needed.” In this circumstance, dosage for these drugs should be discussed with the doctor. Sometimes, if a drug causes drowsiness, you may prefer to give that dose later in the evening. Some drugs need not be given at all if the patient is calm and their mood peaceful with no recent outbursts or loss-of-control.

Much depends on the caregiver’s mood and behavior for some situations. I noticed with my own Mom, if I was calm, she was calm. If I had a bad day and everything tended to strike a nerve with me; then Mom would be edgy and more likely to rage at the smallest thing. So if you can make adjustments to your own behavior, it often brings a favorable result from the patient. If you’re able to ignore or avoid confrontations, a need to sedate your patient may be alleviated altogether.

As a caregiver, your behavior with the patient has a lot to do with how well you take care of yourself. If you’re rested and take occasional time-off to rejuvenate from the hard struggle of care-giving, you’ll feel more like making allowances for a cranky patient. So don’t forget to take care of yourself!

Schedule a “time-out” for YOU!

Perhaps another relative can take charge of the patient for one day a week, or a friend might take the patient for an afternoon. Or, an elderly day-care may become a necessity a couple afternoons every week. Do what you must to take care of yourself, and you’ll find that you have a happier and calmer patient!

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Caregivers Can Find needed Help from Support Groups, Forums

09/225 Comments

Caregivers can find Needed Help

Support Groups help us enjoy the better side of Caregiving

Most of us didn’t plan for–or intend to become a full-time caregiver for a family member. We were taken hostage by a job we never wanted in the first place. So it’s no wonder we become weary and cranky and discouraged when we find ourselves providing care for a loved one 24-hours a day – 7 days a week. We all need emotional Support while care-giving.

If we had been nurses, or counselors, or social workers, or doctors we might have understood what we were in for from the beginning. It might have been easier if we had known how to do many of the things that we only learned by trial and error because we had no such skills. And for many of us it has been extraordinarily difficult; without emotional support or anyone to hear our sadness.

One of the most important things to remember is that there are many other caregivers out there just like you. There is no reason to feel alone. You only have to find a few of those others with the same issues who are willing to help and offer support for each other.

There is something calming about sharing time with others who know the trials you suffer. That’s why I recommend Support Groups. There are many different styles and kinds of Support Groups, so almost anyone can find a Support Group that is comfortable for them.

A few things Support Groups can offer the caregiver:

Education: Speakers and lecturers on topics of interest
Community: A chance to meet and visit with support in your local area
Camaraderie: The opportunity to share experiences and find resolutions for common problems with care-giving
Emotional support: The chance to learn from others and share your own joy with your loved one as well as the sorrows and grief of constant care-giving

To receive emotional support from a group, it’s important that you choose the right group for you. Groups come in as many shapes and sizes as a new pair of shoes, and you may need to spend a little time in your group before they become comfortable.

A few varieties of Support Groups:

A formal group led by trained group members; teachers, nurses, doctors
Informal Group who shares and takes turns leading the meetings
Young People – and Discussions of Early Onset Alzheimer’s
Spouses – Who are caring for Spouses with Alzheimer’s
Adult Children – Who are caring for parents, aunts, uncles, other relatives

It helps to choose a group that is focused on the same concerns that you will face. In such a way, it will hold your interest as well as answer any questions you may have about your own skills. When a groups is focused on the same concerns that you have, it will give you the opportunity to share your fears and hopes for the future of your loved one.

How to Find a Support Group Near you

The Alzheimer’s Office in your city is a great place to start, besides support groups they might also give you phone number for many beneficial numbers that you will need; medical support, support groups, Group homes and Nursing Homes in your area. Your Family physician may also know phone numbers or locations of area Support Groups. Church or Synagogue may have phone numbers or locations of area Support Groups and may host some of those meetings too. Friends, neighbors and relatives often know of local Support Groups also.

Internet Support Groups

Internet support groups may seem less personal as there are no scheduled meetings but rather a continuous dialogue about the subject matter. The benefit of Internet Support Groups is that they are available at any hour and a welcome respite for those who have no time to leave the home for a regularly scheduled meeting.

For three years I spent many hours at an internet Support Group. Eventually you become as familiar with these people and their families as though you’d known each other for many years.

Three Internet Support Groups that I’m familiar with are:

The Alzheimer’s Group Forums

Web Md Alzheimer’s Group Forums

On Facebook: Memory People, Vascular Dementia, Forget me Not,

Whether you choose a local support group or an internet support group, don’t expect to feel comfortable immediately. It takes time to fit-in and feel a part of the group. Try several meetings before you decide a particular group is not for you. If you decide to leave a group, try another. Every group is different, different people, different topics, different personalities. It may take several tries to find the group right for you. But there’s a group out there waiting for your smile.

Memory People™ is a Support Group at Facebook. Established by Rick Phelps, this is a Private group for people who have Alzheimer’s or Dementia, or their loved ones and care givers. If you’d like to join this group, you need to be a member of Facebook and send a “Friend Request” to Rick Phelps.

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With the help of Support Groups we can learn about new resources and strategies to make our life easier from others who are coping with the same situations we face. With the help of Support Groups we can “air” our emotions and receive sympathy and concern from others who have suffered the same stress. Since we are easing and sharing and releasing some of our own stress at the Support Group, we’ll have more time for healthy thinking about the good things that happen as caregivers.

Many books offer assistance for Caregivers as well, some with advice and others with testaments to the positive things that come of caregiving to others.

When we keep ourselves healthy emotionally we are free to enjoy the better moments of care-giving and accurately assess all the good things we bring to another person’s life; fulfilling a commitment to a spouse, sharing final years with an aging parent or more time to deepen our own religious ties or faith.

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Smart Caregiver Economy Wireless Monitor & Motion Sensor

Sometimes, just knowing that the person you care for is safe is a relief. With a monitor you know if they’re still sleeping or resting in their room.

You can monitor the outside doors, knowing they haven’t left the home and are not wandering aimlessly outside.

Monitor the medicine cabinet so they don’t accidentally take medicine that isn’t theirs or the wrong time of day.

Then Take care of yourself. Join an online Support Group or find one in your area through your local Alzheimer’s Organization. Their phone number will be in your local phone directory.

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Chicken Soup for the Soul Chicken Soup for the Caregiver’s

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Being a full-time CareGiver can make you sick – 5 things you can do about it

09/184 Comments

Full-time Caregiver

Yes, being a full-time care-giver can make you sick?

The person you care for depends on your care-giving skills to keep them well. There are things you can do that will not only make yourself sick, but might make your patient sick as well.

Caring for someone full-time with Alzheimer’s or Dementia can make you feel sad, discouraged, frustrated and even trapped. While you know that they can’t control their behavior due to brain damage, it can still get on your nerves to hear the same story over and over, or be asked the same question time and time again. Though you fully understand some easy ways to cope with their odd behavior, you might still become upset if they accuse you of stealing from their purse. If you are constantly putting aside your own needs in order to care for the sick person–your needs are being ignored.

If you aren’t taking time for yourself to rest, or visit with old friends, or just spend time alone, you will begin to feel anxious and sad and frustrated. We all need time to refresh ourselves, time away from our daily burdens. Without that time of renewal you may become irritable, tense, cranky and eventually feel resentful of the care you give to the patient.

Your patient may sense your fatigue and changed behavior toward them, then their attitude might change, too. They might become belligerent and irritable in a struggle to recapture your kind attention.

If you’re caring for your own family as well as an ailing patient, then you are certainly over-burdened and probably ignoring your own needs. To help your patient, you must take action and set goals to improve your own health emotionally and physically. That means including things in your daily schedule that are good for you.

A few things you can do for your own health:

Get enough Rest – Sleep-time as well as time away from the patient. You may need to hire a helper for a few hours every day, or ask another family member sit with the patient occasionally–Though the patient may object, You must take care of yourself to be a healthy care-giver for them.
Spend time with friends -If previous friends have lost touch since you became a full-time care-giver, join a support group. In a group you can share your fears, and sorrows and find great understanding since they have the same burdens. Your local Alzheimer’s Association can direct you to meetings in your local area.
Spend quality time alone – Take a walk, or exercise, or a hobby (maybe one that you’ve set aside due to care-giving), something you truly enjoy.
Find a “listening ear” for Care-Giver Stress – Everyone needs someone to talk to. You need friends, family, a support group, a counselor, or someone who can hear your fears and hopes and dreams and sorrows without judgment. —

My first “listening ear” was an on-line Alzheimer’s Support Group. Though we never saw each other, we shared everything and I felt like they were my sisters. Until I found that group, I thought I was losing my mind with all the strange behavior I’d seen from my mom.

Give Yourself a Present – Everyone needs a lift every now and then. A magazine, a new dress, an ice cream sundae, order a pizza and skip cooking tonight.

Shhh, don’t tell anyone–but I will do just about anything if I tell myself the prize is a new purse.

Make yourself “feel” good because you deserve it, you’ve earned it. You need to be healthy both emotionally and physically for yourself, and for your patient too. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised to see how well your patient responds when you are rested and happy and smiling and a pure pleasure to be around.

Renew yourself–and it will happen.

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Should the Person with Alzheimer’s be told the Diagnosis?

09/124 Comments

Should the Person with Alzheimer’s be told the Diagnosis?

This is a troubling issue and the answer depends on many variables including: patient’s age, stage of Alzheimer’s progression and current health.

If a person is diagnosed with Early-Onset Alzheimer’s at a young age, it’s especially devastating. However, symptoms are identified and the younger person learns of their disease much earlier, usually many years before middle-stage when the sufferer denies their disability exists altogether. So, for the younger sufferer, the earlier they are told of the diagnosis the better their future circumstances.

This person is able to make many of his/her own choices that the older person, in a more advanced stage of dementia, is unable able to make.

Which Medications to take to delay symptoms
Voluntarily give-up their car, drivers license, etc.
Decide who will take care of their finances/provide DPOA, etc.
Decide when they will no longer live alone and choose where they will live (whether Nursing Home or Assisted Living) and make arrangements in advance

If many of these choices are planned in advance, it relieves the caregiver or other loved-ones from the burden of making all the decisions at a time when they are already stressed from providing personal care for the patient. Plus, there are fewer conflicts when the Patient has made their own decisions instead of every choice being made for him/her.

There are many books they may want to read to learn what they can do for them self while they are still aware

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DEMENTIA: Early Diagnosis & Treatments The Nurse Explains: Dementia Dementia Beyond Drugs On Pluto: Inside the Mind of Alzheimer’s The Alzheimer’s Diet Anti-Alzheimer’s Action

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If the Patient is elderly and/or in poor health, it would probably not be wise to share the diagnosis with them. If their progression has moved beyond early-stage symptoms, they are probably no longer aware that they have issues with their memory but are in denial of all memory problems.

In that case, it is best to follow standard advice and hints for coping with an Alzheimer’s sufferer without worry that they need be told of their condition.

A quote that I’ve repeated many times here, is from “The Forgetting,” by David Shenk, “The Alzheimer’s patient does not need the truth, but comfort and love.”

For the Elderly, many of the early symptoms are not recognized because of the tendency to lay blame for any odd behavior on the aging process. So diagnosis and treatment is delayed.

My mom was near middle-stage when diagnosed and I noticed little difference when she began the medications prescribed to slow Alzheimer’s symptoms.

By the time an elderly patient is diagnosed, it is usually too late for them to make healthy choices for their future. Most choices will be left to the family or caregiver. Some will be disturbing and blistering for the patient since their cognitive abilities to understand sound choices has waned.

They don’t want to give up their driving privileges or the family car
They don’t want to leave their home but to live alone
They don’t want to move to a nursing home, though all the facts show that they can no longer be cared for at home

Mom was already in denial about having a memory problem when she was diagnosed and I faced the same issue. Do I tell her–or Not. I couldn’t decide.

Then one afternoon she began to cry and berate my brother for taking her car. She called him names that I’d never heard my mother say in my entire life. It broke my heart that she could feel that way about my brother who was only doing what was best for her. So, the choice was made. I would tell her–and she would understand.

I sat her down on the sofa and began talking, telling her every thing the doctor had told us about her disease in terms she would understand. “Her memory wasn’t as good as it use to be. She was forgetting some things, without realizing it. That was the sole reason my brother had taken her car.”

She squeezed my hand and said, “You guys were just thinking of me. You were trying to do what’s best for me. It’s Alzheimer’s? A memory disease?” She patted my hand and assured me that she understood our actions.

I was so relieved I could hardly speak, my shoulders sagged and stress melted away. She understood. I knew she would.

Mom squeezed my hand again before she stood and walked into the kitchen, and as she reached for the refrigerator door, she turned, looked at me with a blank stare and said, “Did I tell you what your stupid brother did to me. He stole my car. I want it back too. You need to call him and tell him to bring my car back. If he doesn’t bring it back, I’m calling the Sheriff and reporting it stolen. Your stupid brother. I’ll have a gun waiting when he comes back!”

The memory span of someone with Alzheimer’s in middle to late stage is seven seconds. I knew that, yet I fully expected Mom to understand what I said and remember it. She Could Not!

I honestly think the larger Bewilderment with Alzheimer’s is that We Forget!

The person with Alzheimer’s can not reason or learn anything new
The person with Alzheimer’s can not remember beyond a few seconds
The person with Alzheimer’s is no longer able to reason responsibly nor make responsible choices

Before you make your decision whether to tell them about their diagnosis, consider the above circumstances. Their age, their advanced state of dementia, their current health.

I still remember that day occasionally, and how broken-hearted I was when I realized she didn’t remember a single thing I told her. It will probably happen to you also, or other moments that are similar. All we can do is realize our mistake, take care of ourselves, and keep taking care of them.

If you’ve had a foolish moment like mine, I’d enjoy hearing it. The more we share, the more we help those who are struggling with these same problems.

If you’re a caregiver–take care of yourself too!

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Caregiver’s Handbook Daily Comforts for Caregivers The Emotional Survival Guide Hope for the Caregiver The Caregivers: A Support Chicken Soup for the Caregiver’s Soul

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5 Activities to Keep Hands Busy for those with Alzheimer’s or dementias

09/069 Comments

5 Activities to Keep Hands Busy

I receive many requests about items to help the person with Alzheimer’s Dementia keep their hands busy.

My Mom loved to crochet. The only stitch she remembered after mid-stage dementia was the single crochet and chain stitch.

But she could still crochet in circles and created 100’s of Circular Hot Pads for use in the Group Home where she lived and as gifts for friends and family.

The “Group Home” proudly displayed Mom’s Hot Pads as table mats for the dining room table, smaller ones as glass coasters, and many for her friends as dresser scarves for their nightstands and dressers.

Mom crocheted endlessly but every stitch brought immeasurable pleasure. Her eyes would light up with each hot-pad she gave as a gift.

I hope your loved one finds something as fulfilling as my Mom’s crochet. As I’ve stated earlier, when my Mom finally forgot that very last stitch of crochet, she still colored in her coloring book until the end.

What I noticed most was that she wanted to keep her fingers and hands busy, almost like warding off some agitation in her fingers.

There was only one gentlemen in the Group Home where Mom stayed, but I noticed he enjoyed fiddling with large wooden beads. He would string them on a heavy cord, then take them off and string them again.

When mom could no longer crochet, she started coloring. She might color the entire page one color, or complete an intricate design with beautiful colors. It depended on her mood. All those Coloring pages are dear to me now.

Besides the calming affect of coloring, my mom ate better, slept better and was happier with her coloring books. They were a blessing, indeed.

A Walk in the Woods (Dover Nature Coloring Book) Adult Coloring Book: Stress Relieving Patterns Audubon’s Birds of America Coloring Book

A few ideas for nervous agitated finger activities are:

Large Wooden Beads – Yarn or twine for stringing them.
Crayons and Coloring Books – A calming effect for the person with dementia.
Word find books such as Seek and Find Words. My Mom loved these books too.
Crochet, Knit, finger knitting,
Paint small ceramics (Paint Colors – Do not frustrate with lots of choices)
Sound Blocks (shown above) These are cute blocks that can be moved and turned to create animals which produces the animal’s sound when the puzzle is solved. Lots of fun for the Man or Woman who love Puzzles.

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Many with Memory Loss love Jig Saw Puzzles with large pieces and I found that Search-a-Word Books kept Mom occupied for quite a while – She loved the books

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