Blog
How Does Lack of Sleep Affect the Elderly in Miami-Dade
Posted by Scott Cantin in Alzheimer's Disease, home care, Senior Care | 0 comments
Sleep is an important mechanism that helps you restore energy and heal cognitive and physical damage. It’s more critical in seniors as the quality of sleep gradually deteriorates. Some conditions, such as diabetes, osteoporosis, asthma, and Alzheimer’s disease, can have a negative impact on sleep.
As a caregiver in Miami-Dade, it’s your responsibility to help your seniors improve their quality of sleep in their later years. At Advancare, we recommend a regular sleeping pattern for seniors that lasts between seven and nine hours every night. Our experienced caregivers help provide senior home care services that help boost your senior’s overall health and comfort.
Why is Sleep So Important?
Sleep is an integral part of life that allows your body to rest, recharge, and restore energy. Sleep keeps you healthier, alert, focused, stronger, and happier while helping your body repair damaged organs and cells. Lack of sleep, on the other hand, can lead to depression, memory problems, and increased pain sensitivity.
That’s why seniors need to have a regular sleeping pattern that helps ensure they’re well-rested. By encouraging your loved one to have a regular sleeping schedule, you will be helping them achieve the following:
- Reduced medication usage
- Increase alertness during waking hours
- Improved cardiovascular health
- Regulated appetite
- Enhanced memory and attention
- Reduced risk of falling
- Happier and more engaged lifestyle
- Reduced depression symptoms
- Reduced stress and anxiety
Common Reasons for Poor Sleep in Older People
There are many reasons why your senior loved one may struggle to fall asleep or sleep longer hours. Apart from medical conditions, seniors may struggle to sleep due to the following:
- Effects of medication
- Sleeping too much during the day
- Cognitive impairment
- Too much light and other distractions
- Drinking or eating certain foods before bedtime
- Not being physically active throughout the day
How To Promote Good Sleep for Older People
Disrupted sleep in older adults causes them to spend longer in bed, sleeping at intervals throughout the day to catch up. These short intervals may not provide the full benefits that sleep offers, such as boosting the immune system and aiding memory. That’s why you may want to help your senior loved one sleep better.
You can start by visiting a health professional to review the causes of disrupted sleep. You can enquire about tangible steps to improve your loved one’s sleeping habits and improve the quality of their sleep. Here are tips you can utilize to help promote good sleep in an older person.
- Use the bedroom for sleeping only: Create a conducive atmosphere that promotes sleep. Choose paint colors and lights that help you fall asleep faster. Avoid doing other activities other than sleeping in your bedroom.
- Have a ritual for relaxing before bed: Decide what you should do before bed, such as reading a book, taking a warm shower, or engaging in a few exercises. This helps prepare your brain to know that it’s time for bed.
- Find ways of falling asleep: Reading a book and listening to music are all great ways of falling asleep. Find what works for you and implement it.
- Engage in daily activities that keep you active and nourished: These could be simple activities like reading books, painting, baking, cooking, or even playing games with other seniors or friends.
We Can Help
Not sure how to go about helping your senior loved one sleep better? Our team at Advancare is here to help. We offer high-quality services through our caregivers, from light housekeeping, errand running, medication management, and much more. Contact us today to learn more.
Make Mealtimes Easier for People with Alzheimer’s in Miami-Dade
Posted by Scott Cantin in Alzheimer's Disease, home care, Senior Health | 0 comments
Mealtimes can be particularly difficult for people with Alzheimer’s disease. As a result, caregivers may spend more time helping seniors eat, which can affect their housekeeping duties and other tasks. The condition causes cognitive impairment and a decline in sensory perception and coordination, all of which can lead to lost appetite and poor feeding. While there’s no cure for these symptoms, there are steps you can take to make mealtimes easier. At Advancare, we prepare our caregivers to provide full care. Here are the steps we recommend making mealtimes easier for your senior loved one with Alzheimer’s.
Create a Conducive Dining Setting
People with Alzheimer’s disease may have trouble concentrating or focusing. The best way to make them feel more comfortable is by creating a distraction-free environment. Make the eating area quiet and simple by turning off the TV and radio. Avoid placing too many items on the dining table, such as floral arrangements. Keep the lights fairly bright, not too dim or too bright. You can make good use of natural light. Avoid filling their plates with different types of food. Instead, serve one at a time. You can also ask or let them choose.
Make Different Foods Stand Out From the Plate
A person with Alzheimer’s may have difficulty identifying foods or differentiating types of foods. To help them identify foods better, serve them on plates with solid contrasting colors, which makes it easy to identify the food from the background. Plain white plates are great for serving simple, colorful meals like rice, minced meat stew, and a few greens. A Boston University research has found that seniors with Alzheimer’s disease ate more when served meals on red plates.
Test the Food Temperature Before Serving
A person with Alzheimer’s may be unable to detect when their food or drink is too hot or cold. Always check food and beverage temperatures before serving to prevent burns.
Make Mealtime a Social Occasion
Mealtime should be inherently social. Despite your busy schedule, sit and eat with your senior loved one and enjoy each other’s company. It’s an excellent opportunity to sit down and have a little chat. You can set the mood with a happy and warm tone of voice.
This helps the senior to look forward to mealtimes. Providing company for Alzheimer’s disease patients as they eat offers other additional benefits, including reduced stress and improved overall moods.
Allow Plenty of Time for Eating
People with Alzheimer’s need additional time to eat and finish their meals. They may take as much as an hour or more to finish their plate of food. Avoid rushing them and give the person ample time, support, and space to finish the meal. Encourage them to chew slowly and take their time. You can simplify this by cutting the food into smaller pieces and making it as soft as possible. This helps with chewing and swallowing. Avoid packing their plates with plenty of food, as it may feel overwhelming for a senior.
Need caregiving services in Miami-Dade? Our caregivers at Advancare have the skills and qualifications to care for your senior loved one with Alzheimer’s disease. Fill our online contact us form or give us a call on (305) 441-9794 and we will be happy to discuss how to improve your senior loved one’s life.
How to Diagnose Dementia in Miami
Posted by Scott Cantin in Alzheimer's Disease, Dementia | 0 comments
Dementia is a catchall term for memory, social, and thinking symptoms that disrupt the person’s daily function. Alzheimer’s Disease, for example, is one of the most common causes of dementia, but it is far from the only one. Having a loved one diagnosed with dementia can be a terrifying experience. Learning about the symptoms and stages of dementia, as well as dementia aftercare options, will help you better prepare for life with this disease.
Dementia Stages
Dementia can go through five stages, though these stages can vary depending on what part of the brain has been affected. The dementia stages include:
- No Impairment
No signs of dementia, but tests may alert the doctor to a potential problem.
- Questionable Impairment
Signs of slight memory loss is there, but nothing that makes a major impact on their daily life.
- Mild Impairment
This is the stage when disruptions to the sufferer’s daily life typically begins. Problems keeping up with personal care and difficulty with directions are two common signs that your loved one is in the dementia stage. At this stage, some patients can still live in their home, but may require the help of light housekeeping services.
- Moderate Impairment
The fourth dementia stage usually causes issues with their ability to maintain personal hygiene and their short-term memory is affected.
- Severe Impairment
At this stage of dementia your loved one doesn’t have the ability to care for themselves and will need the help of a dementia caregiver. Reach out to Advancare, the trusted caregivers in Miami-Dade Advancare, immediately if your loved one has severe impairment.
What to Expect
The first thing to expect with dementia is short-term memory loss. This loss will start off small and gradually become worse. As the disease worsens, forgetfulness will become more severe, and they may even forget their name, who their family members are, and where they live. While in the early dementia stages, your loved one will most like could care for themselves. Unfortunately, how long a dementia patient can maintain their independence varies greatly from one person to the next. For some, the disease progresses rapidly, while others live for years without needing help from a caregiver.
How to Diagnose Dementia in Miami
Diagnosing dementia doesn’t rely on one single test. Instead, doctors use the patients’ medical history, laboratory tests, behavior, physical examination, and changes to the person’s daily functions and characteristics. Another thing to remember is that while doctors can diagnose dementia with certainty, it is harder for them to determine what type of dementia the patient has. This is because most types of dementia have the same or similar brain changes and symptoms.
When to Call a Professional
Knowing when the right time to call a professional for a dementia patient will ensure they have the highest quality of life. If they require 24-hour supervision and care, are unable to speak or control their movements, or are battling an infection, then you should seek the help of dementia care professionals. Consult with their doctor if you’re still unsure if it is the right time to place your loved one in a Miami-Dade aftercare home.
If you need help caring for a loved one with dementia and don’t know where to turn, call Advancare, the trusted caregivers in Miami-Dade, today. Our staff is happy to discuss what aftercare options we have for people dealing with dementia and how we can help them, as well as their family.
Alzheimer’s and Dementia: The Facts
Posted by Scott Cantin in Alzheimer's Disease, caregiving, caregiving tips, Dementia, depression, elderly care, home care, mental health, Senior Health | 0 comments
Understanding the Difference – Alzheimer’s & Dementia
Alzheimer’s is a degenerative disease of the brain. It is the leading cause of dementia, which is a term for a group of symptoms including memory loss, impaired judgment, loss of language, and reduced motor skills. There is currently no known cure for Alzheimer’s disease.
Time Management and You
Posted by Scott Cantin in Alzheimer's Disease, caregiver stress, caregiving, caregiving tips, depression, home care, mental health, Senior Health | 0 comments
When our brains age, it may become tougher to remember things that you easily used to remember. To prevent this, there are many different things you can do to both strengthen your memory and improve your time management skills. Check out our previous post that focused on improving your mental health from a couple of weeks ago for some tips on how to keep your memory sharp. This week’s post focuses on time management and what you can do to improve it while bettering yourself.
New Advancements in Alzheimer’s Treatment
Posted by Scott Cantin in Alzheimer's Disease, caregiving, caregiving tips, Dementia, elderly care, health innovations, home care, injury recovery, mental health, Senior Health | 0 comments
There are many new advancements in the medical field every single day. Many of these advancements are extremely surprising to a lot of people. It can be quite exciting when someone finds a possible treatment that is not only effective, but also easy to obtain and relatively cheap. That is exactly what happened to Dr. Mary Newport and her husband, who is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease.
5 Tips for Alzheimer’s Caregivers
Posted by Scott Cantin in Alzheimer's Disease, caregiving, caregiving tips | 0 comments
Hundreds of people are now becoming an Alzheimer’s caregiver, especially to their loved ones. This is a big responsibility and a tough commitment to any particular person. It is unfortunate that many individuals who are acting as a caregiver to patients with Alzheimer’s have no formal caregiver training, which leaves them to just sit and watch their loved ones as they go through this progressive disease. It is always a challenging journey for every Alzheimer’s caregiver. In this regard, here are 5 tips to remember as you take on these new and challenging responsibilities as an .
Lack of Sleep Contributes to Alzheimer’s, Studies Suggest
Posted by Scott Cantin in Alzheimer's Disease, mental health | 0 comments
You might want to start rethinking about hitting that all-night sleep. Studies are suggesting that the lack of sleep and sleep disturbances leads to Alzheimer’s disease.
According to a study published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, the chemical changes in brain cells caused by lack of sleep (resulting into a jet lag-like effect) contributes to learning and memory loss. Though some may consider their sleep disturbances as something normal, older adults experience this more frequently. These becomes more severe when Alzheimer’s disease is apparent.
Sleep problems that commonly affect people with Alzheimer’s are:
Are You An Alzheimer’s Caregiver? 5 Strategies to Reduce Caregiver Burnout
Posted by Scott Cantin in Alzheimer's Disease, caregiver burnout, caregiver stress | 0 comments
Being an Alzheimer’s caregiver can be a stressful profession. Not only will you want to fulfill the expected duties of a caregiver but you also have to deal with patients with special needs, such as those with Alzheimer. Caregiving can be a daunting task, so if you are a caregiver it’s normal to feel stressed and fatigued. This is natural as Caregiving is strenuous task, however you should always remember to give yourself time to recover. Remember that you can only do so much.
The Fine Line Between Cognitive Aging and Alzheimer’s
Posted by Scott Cantin in Alzheimer's Disease, Cognitive Aging | 0 comments
When one thinks about aging and retirement, thoughts would either go to the many things they couldn’t do when they were still working or to the long list of ailments seniors tend to feel when age finally catches up with them. One of these ailments that many tend to worry about is Alzheimer’s. In fact, just a simple moment of forgetfulness makes them start to worry if they have the disease themselves.
