Alzheimer’s is most commonly diagnosed in people over the age of 65, but it can also occur in people of ’30s or ’40s. In this disease, a person starts forgetting things, names, and faces of their family and friends, might point to an object like a toothbrush, and feel helpless to say an exact word because their storage of language has been affected by the disease. People may have started forgetting the name and faces of their family and friends.
Someone you love or your elder one is having Alzheimer’s? You can hire a caregiver or nursing assistant to provide them healthcare service at home. I can understand how difficult it is to take care of a person, having difficulty remembering the names and faces of their families, friends, important dates, and things. If you’re a caregiver, then first you need to understand what happens in Alzheimer’s disease?
What happens to the brain in Alzheimer’s Disease?
In Alzheimer’s disease, neurons get destroyed, stop functioning, the connection between brain cells (networks of neurons) may break down and die throughout the brain. It later affects cerebral cortex areas that are responsible for language, reasoning, and social behavior. At last, the other parts of brain are injured, causing significant loss of brain volume.
Taking care of someone having Alzheimer’s comes with many challenges. The symptoms get worsen as the disease progresses, bringing new challenges for caregivers. Here, we have discussed a few tips a caregiver should follow while caring for someone living with Alzheimer’s Disease.
1. Help Them Spend Time with Families
Alzheimer’s patients may have trouble remembering friends or families, so schedule meetings with their family and friend on weekends to introduce them, spend quality time with their families, and help them to recognize their family’s faces and names.
You can also show them albums and with the photos you can remind them about their families. Teach their grand-children to interact with their grandparents and ask them to try coloring books, listen to music and play together.
2. Make a Routine
Taking care of Alzheimer’s or dementia patients is no easy task. You need to be very calm and communicate with your patient politely. Make a daily routine for your patient for activities such as waking up, exercise, mealtimes, bathing, dressing, medicines time, meeting visitors or families, and bedtime.
If your patients are not following your routine, don’t get frustrated and shout at them. Talk to them very politely and make them understand to follow the routine.
3. Plan Activities
Caregivers can keep their patients engaged and active by planning some activities like playing games, watching movies, visiting families or friends, exercise (jogging, stretching, walking), yoga, listening to calm and soft music, cooking, etc. You can also plan an outing like going to a restaurant, park, museum, or spa.
4. Give Them Healthy & Nutritious Diet
Being a caregiver, make sure that your patient is getting enough nutritious and healthy food to eat. You should serve meals at the same time every day and help them to take multivitamins and medicines. Try to serve foods that are easy to chew and swallow. Give them much time to eat.
5. Boost their Confidence and Self-esteem
You can boost their self-esteem and confidence by assisting them in grooming and hygiene. Show them how to brush their teeth by brushing your teeth at the same time. If your Alzheimer’s patient is a woman and she loves doing makeup, then you can encourage her to wear makeup like applying lipstick, using powder and blush, etc.
Give them privacy as much as possible. Help them to take a bath or shower, put a towel over their shoulder, clean their body with a sponge or cotton cloth and teach them how to wear clothes, and shoes. You can ask them to help in household chores such as cooking, dusting, laundry, etc.
Make your Alzheimer’s disease patient feel comfortable and relaxed in the present moment. Caring for seniors at home is easy now with homecare nursing services provided by a skilled and qualified home care aide. There are many platforms that help you connect with trained and specialized caregivers or nursing assistants. You can hire an experienced caregiver to provide your elderly parents good home care services.