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Fall Prevention

By attacking a variety of fall factors, you can significantly reduce the chance of serious injury in seniors. Some tips include:

• Exercise regularly
• Have a medical professional (physician or pharmacist) review their medications (prescription and non-prescription)
• Have an eye doctor check their vision (yearly)
• Improve in-home lighting
• Eliminate hazards in the home that can lead to falls.
• Increase your home’s accessibility with grab bars, non-slip mats, etc.

Links:

Fall Prevention
Preventing Falls Among Seniors

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Low or Limited Vision

There are a number of things that you can do to accomodate seniors who have vision difficulties:

• Start with lighting, lots of it – task lighting, night lights and hallway lights. Be sure to make the lighting even by reducing dark, or high glare areas.
• Pay attention to door frames, light switches and stairways – Use contrasting paints, or brightly colored tape, to make them easier to discern.
• Make it easier to navigate the home – reposition furniture, eliminate clutter and use contrasting colored rugs.

Links:

Home and Kitchen Safety If You are Blind or Have Low Vision
Home Safety – Adapt to Vision
Home Safety Tips for Low Vision: Live Independently and Avoid Falling

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Home Safety for People with Alzheimer’s

While many of the above tips are relevant and helpful for protecting those with Alzheimer’s, there are a good number of tips that are more specifically relevant:

• Consider a NO SOLICITING sign for the front gate or door.
• Install childproof door latches on storage cabinets and drawers designated for breakable or dangerous items.
• Insert a drain trap in the kitchen sink to catch anything that may otherwise become lost or clog the plumbing.
• Adjust the water heater to 120 degrees to avoid scalding tap water.

Links:

Home Safety for People with Alzheimer’s Disease (PDF)
Home Safety and Alzheimer’s Disease

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Emergency Safety – File of Life:

The official website for the city of Fairfax, Virginia explains that the File of Life contains, “a program door decal, a File of Life Information Card and a vinyl cardholder for placement on your refrigerator door.

The File of Life information card has areas to record personal information concerning medical conditions, drug allergies, emergency contact numbers for friends and family members, doctors information, prescription information and any special circumstances rescue personnel should know.”

Links:

File of Life

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Prescription Safety

What can go wrong with prescription medicines? Plenty. Seniors take a lot of medicines and between interactions and incorrect usage, a lot can happen if you don’t prepare:

• Keep a list of every medication they are taking and take it to every medical appointment.
• The patient should always let the primary care physician know when another physician prescribes a new medication, or if they have any problems with a new medication.
• Try to use only one pharmacy for the prescriptions.
• Use a weekly or daily pill organizer, especially when taking several different medications, to help ensure that they get the right dose at the right time.
• Keep medications in their original containers, except for those they put in a pill organizer.
• Choose one day each year (their birthday is an easy reminder) to check the expiration dates of their medications.

Links:

Tips on Helping Manage Prescriptions

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Keep Your Seniors Safe from Scams

There are always people looking to take money from the elderly and with the economy worsening, the scammers are likely to become more aggressive while the potential victims are more vulnerable to the hope of economic salvation. Consider some of these tips:

• Help convince older people, who may be targets.
• Help older people recognize the “red flags” of fraud like, a promise that you can win money, make money, or borrow money easily.
• Recognize when older people have been victimized or may be in grave danger and know how to help them.
• Inform older people about how to reduce the number of unwanted sales calls and mailings they receive and how to deal effectively with telemarketers.

Links:

Tips on Avoiding Scams
More Tips on Avoiding Scams

This is a beautifully designed document that every senior should complete.  It comes with a coversheet that has the patient complete their personal information along with emergency contact information and information on any allergies or problems with medications.

It then asks the patient to complete an easy to use spreadsheet with answers to the following questions:

• Drug name
• This looks like
• How many?
• How I take it
• I started taking this on:
• I stop taking this on:
• Why I take it:
• Who told me to take it:

The table is broken out by times of day with easy to understand icons for each time of the day:

• When I get up I take:
• In the afternoon, I take:
• In the evening, I take:
• Before I go to bed, I take:
• Other medicines that I do not use every day:

The corresponding directions are easy to read and provide excellent instructions for completing the document.

Once you have completed the document, it is best to print multiple copies to keep at home wherever medications are administered and in the patient’s wallet or purse for emergencies.

A Detroit Free Press article found on the Royal Oak, Michigan fire department’s website, states that when emergency workers respond to emergency calls on behalf of senior citizens, the seniors “‘forget to tell us important information – - surgeries, allergies,’ said Marrs, a firefighter/paramedic for West Bloomfield [Michigan]. ‘They panic. Or maybe they can’t talk. So we have to go through medicine cabinets and refrigerators looking for clues as to what kind of medical problems they many have.”

The official website for the city of Fairfax, Virginia explains that the File of Life contains, “a program door decal, a File of Life Information Card and a vinyl cardholder for placement on your refrigerator door.

The File of Life information card has areas to record personal information concerning medical conditions, drug allergies, emergency contact numbers for friends and family members, doctors information, prescription information and any special circumstances rescue personnel should know.”

Marrs told the Detroit Fress Press, “This file of Life tells us everything we need to know so we can concentrate on patient care rather than asking 100 different questions.”
Many police and fire departments across the country are offering these packets free of charge. Please contact your local police and/or fire department to see if they are providing them to seniors in your community.

However, if your community is not providing these packets free of charge, the city of Chesapeak, Virginia provides visitors to their site with a black and white pdf for you to print, complete and post until you are able to find a magnetic one branded in bright red for your refrigerator.

Note: Linda Lynch, a recent visitor to Senior Help Forum, suggested the topic of this post.