Helping Your Elderly Relatives Look After Their Health

As you start to get older and older, your health begins to deteriorate and your body is just not quite capable of doing the things you used to do. Watching a relative struggle through this experience is tough, and it’s natural to develop the feeling that you must intervene in order to ensure that they can stay as calm and comfortable as possible. Fortunately there are many different things you can do that will help to improve your elderly relatives wellbeing and aid them in gaining back some of their independence, and it couldn’t be simpler to get started. So, if you want to know more about what you can do to provide the best level of care for your family when they reach old age, then read on to uncover some amazing tips and tricks that you can begin implementing to improve their lives today. 

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Tune Their Senses
The senses are one of the biggest contributors of daily life that begin to lose quality as you grow older, so taking some action to ensure that your elderly relative can hear and see you as best they can is so important. Start off by taking them to regular check ups at the appropriate centres for vision and hearing tests to get professional advice from those carrying out the tests, and source any necessary treatment yourself to avoid them potentially getting mixed up and receiving the wrong or no treatment. Listen Lively produce some of the best hearing aid devices on the market, and these are an essential investment to ensure that your elderly relative can tune in to your voice and block out the background noise to continue some form of social life. If they are having trouble with their sight, there are many different options to choose from – glasses are the easiest treatment, as they are just so simple to use and can be put on special neck chains to avoid them being misplaced, whilst things like laser eye treatment are more permanent solutions that just require a short session but come with a much greater amount of risks. Of course it all depends if the severity of their vision loss and the treatment which they personally prefer, so ask them what they think suits best. 

Adapt Their Home
Adapting their home will give them so much more independence, as it can help to take away the need for a carer or some other kind of assistance to perform their daily tasks. It’s going to be individual to your own relatives needs, but there are a few key features that can be a really great addition to their home. Starting off in the bathroom, it’s a great idea to install a plastic foldaway chair in their shower, as it reduces the chances of them slipping and the time they have to spend on their feet. As well as this, adding some grab bars close to the toilet will help them to stand up without needing any assistance and give them something to lean on when making their way into the bathroom. If they struggle with their mobility, ensure that you make some adjustments all around the home to ensure they can get to every room with ease. This can be done by clearing a large enough pathway to allow a wheelchair or walker or continuing on with the grab bars previously mentioned, and also investing in a good quality stair lift to reduce the risk of them falling when climbing to the next floor of their home. When it comes to their bedroom, they may struggle to climb out of their bed each morning, and without any help this could mean that they are stuck there all day. Luckily there are many different mechanical beds that lift up to help gently raise them up and guide them to a seated or standing position, and these movements can be easily controlled by a small remote. Investing some time and money into making these adaptations in their home will help them to keep as much independence as they possibly can, whilst staying as comfortable and safe as possible. 

Helping your elderly relatives to look after their health can be a big responsibility, but it’s so rewarding to watch their wellbeing improve as you follow the steps above. Focus on their senses to ensure that they can see and hear you properly, whilst making some beneficial adaptations to their home that will reduce their risk of injury and aid them in keeping their independence.