Question:
How can I get Alzheimers care for my mom? She's "too rich" for programs, but not rich enough for private pay.
tmsullivan
2007-10-23 07:24:45 UTC
My mom has early onset dementia or Alzheimers. I do not want to put her in a nursing home. There are care facilities near us for $3600-$4200 a month. She has some savings and I'm willing to use them to give her the best care, but the money would run out and then, I'm told, she would have to go to a nursing home in order to get Medicare reimbursement.
Four answers:
2007-10-23 08:24:22 UTC
Get the needed equipment (hospital bed with a rail she can't clim over or through, a wheelchair, a walker, pottie chair, and a waist restraint you can attach to her normal sitting chair) and keep her at home. Just make sure that you don't use the waist restraint in a chair that she can tip over. (the wheelchair shouldn't be used as her normal sitting chair. it should be used only for transport, and only if needed.)



You can get good used hospital beds, wheelchairs and the like from places like Salvation Army, Goodwill, etc. Call around. If they don't have what you need, ask them if they know of an outlet in your town which sells used hospital beds or whatever else it is you need. If you keep searching, you will persevere. Those resources are always available, but are often under publicized. Also, look in the classified ads in the paper, look in your local greensheet or thrifty nickel (american classified ads is another name it has).



Enlist the help of relatives when you need a sitter. Or look for adult day care facilities (they have one in my small city).



When it (alzheimer's) advances, she will have to stop wearing dentures, and you will have to get a smoothie blender, and make smoothies for her to eat, as well as soup, and Ensure (a nutritious canned drink). You can feed that stuff to her with a turkey baster. Of course, you will need to put a bib on her to catch the spill.



You should keep her at home as long as you can, because in the later stages of the disease, she will forget how to swallow. This will necessitate the surgical installation of a stomach (feeding) tube. When she gets that, she may be better off in a professional care facility.



One day it will get to the point when she cannot be left alone in a room for any real amount of time, for safety reasons. When this happens, don't feel bad about putting a waist restraint on her so she can't get up from her chair during the times of the day when you can't watch her (when you wash dishes, or take a bath, etc.) I guarantee you, they do the same thing to folks in professional care facilities, even the best ones. But when they do it, they usually leave the people restrained for much longer than personal caregivers do. Just make sure that you don't use the waist restraint in a chair that she can tip over. Her normal sitting chair should be a heavy one she can't tip over.



We took care of my Grandmother at home for many years. She got much better care at home than she would have in any professional care facility.



Your cheapest option is to keep her at home. And as I say, you may have no choice but to put her in a professional care facility in a few years, so hang onto her as long as you can.



Good luck to you, and God bless you.
Gevera Bert
2007-10-23 18:56:47 UTC
Call an elder care lawyer--now, even if you think you don't need one. These people specialize in helping people like your mom. We found ours through http://www.naela.com. Our elder care lawyer is great and if we had found her sooner she could have helped us preserve more of our assets and gotten us more help. My dad has early-onset Alzheimer's too; now he's at stage 7 (final) and in a nursing home at $320 a day until my mom runs out of money and then Title 19 takes over.

Keep her home as long as possible. My dad's only been in the nursing home about 6 weeks and he's gone from stage 5 to 7 in that time. Moving an Alzheimer's patient causes severe decline.
nursekuba
2007-10-23 07:31:19 UTC
Not sure where you live, but in AZ there are group homes where people live in a home with several other people and there are 24 hr caregivers there. They are usually a little less expensive than some other options. I know in AZ the Arizona Long Term Care Coverage (for poor people) is sometimes accepted by the group homes. Do some investigation in your area and see what you need to do.
2007-10-24 00:36:42 UTC
ONLY FOR INTELLIGENT THINKING PEOPLE



Please trust about Power of pirith chanted by Lord buddha 2500 year before. No need to come to Buddhism. Any religion is not a problem for this since this is mental strength developing by your and parents.

2 hours early morning and evening allow your parents to listen carefully and intelligently. Please keep in mind intelligently is very important.

Visit weblink : http://milkpowd.blogspot.com

read about power of pirith 3 to 4 times then you have to find where you can download pirith from the internet.

Weblinks are given.

Please continuous 2 weeks time and see the improvement. if there is improvement please continue that until 100% cure while getting any medicine.

Rathana piritha (sutta) (Maha piritha include Rathana piritha also) & Bhojjhanga piritha are the ideal for to cure 100% any kind of diseases.

If you need to contact me please contact to shantha95@gmail.com


This content was originally posted on Y! Answers, a Q&A website that shut down in 2021.
Loading...