Posted on 05/14/2014 2:53:35 PM PDT by grayhog
Hi All ,
We're moving my mother home from a nursing home and am in the process if hiring care for her. We need 24 hour live in, though mom sleeps through the night. She is immobile, hoyer lift needed. In talking with willing applicants, it seems they need to shift her every 2 hours. Because of that, the care required is more involved. The quote I'm getting is $375 a day. That adds up to $136k per year?! Does that seem right? Any thoughts from my Freeper friends much appreciated.
My sister does home health care for the same price you mentioned, and she is very good at it. Sis has been trained and worked for a local nursing home in the past. It’s not just the money, she enjoys the company of those with stories to tell about the good old days.
Let me also put in a huge plug for hospice care.
Hospice took over the care of my parents, and they became the case managers were paid for by medicare and were the most kind, loving, religious, wonderful people i have ever worked with. Your parents do not have to be at end of life, just running down and with in a year or two of possible death. The nursing homes and doctors had them on to many drugs that often interfere with each other. For instance it was keeping my dad up all night and had him sleeping during the day. The Hospice nurse fixed all of that knew exactly the right things to use and involved me in 100% of the decisions. Hospice even sent in a social worker and a visiting pastor who were just wonderful. Let me tell you for both my parents, myself and my family, hospice allowed me to give my parents the dignified end of life quality of life they deserved. It also allowed me to keep my job, deal with my Autistic daughter, my marriage and my own emotional baggage of watching my mom and dad waste away and lose their brilliant minds with alzheimer’s. The people who work for Hospice do it as a career choice because they care. For several years I did all of this care myself, ran over every day at lunch, many nights and weekends. You can only do that for so long before it takes its toll on you personally and your family and career.
Nursing home is always cheaper and the care is better. It sucks but it is better.
My mom’s in-home care slept through the call button that brought EMS
It is all terrible for everyone. Modern Medicine... what has it done to us? We once died peacefully at home or in the hospital after a short but terminal illness. Now, with the aid of the “best care money can buy” we struggle out losing our mobility, freedom, faculties and often our dignity in the process.
On average, we live no longer than most of the rest of the modern world but we spend a whole lot more money doing it.
In my family we go through the same things the other FReepers here describe. Can’t find help, costs a fortune, we can’t drop our work and go take care of ________ ourselves, constant worry and strain from one crisis to the other, good days and bad days but increasing numbers of bad days and on and on. I think we are lucky. We found a competent and apparently caring place near my sis for Mom to go to. It isn’t home but it is the best we could do. It sure isn’t what Dad wanted or what I promised him but I didn’t know the price of the promise when I made it. It tears me up for failing him.
I hope I am somehow blessed as an old family friend was. He went out to feed and check on his cows. Took his cow dog with him. They didn’t come home at the usual time. Went out to the farm and found him leaning up against the wheel on his truck with his dog beside him. He was dead. Apparently got out of the truck, fed, felt bad, sat on the ground leaning up against the truck and died. I want to die in the field with my boots on but don’t bury me in Texas! Please take me back to Oklahoma.
First of all, I offer my sympathy to you. I have been dealing with the same thing. After my Mom passed, my Dad (age 96) wanted to live at an assisted living facility. That worked very well for for about two years......until he developed dementia. They could no longer keep him, but he wasn’t quite ready for a nursing home.
We built an apartment in our walk-out basement for him and brought him home. Yes, he is a handful. But he still is able to shower, feed and toilet himself. He is paranoid, cranky, delusional, wanders about and needs someone to check on him.
I am up and down the stairs a dozen times a day with his food, pills, snacks and just tending to him.
My husband and I spend a couple of months a year in Arizona and I have a wonderful neighbor (retired nurse) who comes to check on him three times a day while we are gone. She does his meds, light cleaning, laundry, amd visits with him. I pay her $200 per week. I consider it a real bargain.
He is beginning to fail quite rapidly now and I know that a nursing home is coming shortly. I’m over 70 and have my own health issues, but I love him dearly and will keep him here as long as I can. My husband has been a tremendous help and support. I couldn’t do it without him.
Good luck. I know how difficult it can be.
I agree with others, it may be better to put her in some sort of facility. I know with my MIL we had people who just didn’t do what they were supposed to do and if we had been able to be there with her to be sure they did their job then we wouldn’t have needed them in the first place.
She’s in an assisted living home now and it is wonderful, we don’t have to worry about her.
I’ll echo this. The facility is better equipped to handle geriatrics than you can do it at home.
We have been very fortunate that the manager at the assisted living facility is a Saint in my book. We are also very blessed that my sis is also being nominated for Saint hood since she goes to see Mom at least three times a week and calls her faithfully every night at 8PM. Mom wants for nothing but she complains about almost everything and seems to appreciate nothing most days.
we hired a trusted cousin who needed a job. we fill in when we can.
grayhog,I’m glad you posted this as I’m presently going through the same thing with my 96 year old mother. Had visiting Angels with here for most of 2013 did a great job they said they would give me a special rate for 24 hours at $260/hr the only problem is the Visiting Angels were non medical folks so they couldn’t do here meds. There are other complications but it appears that we are going to be faced with hiring a live in nurse. Good luck to you I know it’s not easy. Prayers up.
A Low Air Loss Mattress is much better. My wife uses one and her doctor that treated her pressure sores recommended it. They do cost more. Some insurers will pay some want and if the person is Diabetic I understand it makes the approval process easier. My wife uses one due to quadriplegia. They are roughly $1000. But they save thousands of dollars in doctor bills. One pressure sore treatment can run in the thousands of dollars real fast.
Have you looked into Residential Care Homes for the Elderly (RCFEs), aka “care homes” or “board and care”? Around here they charge appx $5K per month for the type of care you describe; in larger cities can go to $10K/month. My mother required turning to avoid bed sores and this type of facility worked out great for her.
i don't know from long term, my Mom was terminal and didn't last three months and the one we had was much better than not having one... but this was 25 years ago so i hope things have improved since then i hope the best for you and your wife, prayers up
Don't be afraid to learn some of the skills she needs yourself. I worked in a nursing home but had absolutely no patient care experience or training. I was a maintenance mechanic. I met a CNA working there and on a date she became a quad and after we married I became her husband & caregiver. That was 29 years ago. I learned to do the care by our co-workers & friends training me and the hospital also taught me a lot before she came home. Plus my wife know enough to talk me through things I wasn't sure about because she had done them before.
In 29 years we've used Home Health maybe 24 total visits. The nurses show me once or twice and I take it from there. I also did most of my dads Hospice with my mom and nieces help.
Some people can do a family members home care and some can't. It's not a personal failure if a person can't handle it emotionally or knowledge wise. But it is good to have skilled knowledge you can access 24/7 if you do meaning a nurse on call.
Yea the big improvement is the low air loss mattress. It stems from a technology they developed about 25 years ago from what was called a Kinetic Mattress which in about 1988 cost tens of thousands of dollars. It's as thick as a hospital bed mattress {replaces it actually} and has huge chambers the air circulates through. Plus it is fully adjustable. Most Alternating Pressure Pads are pre set to hard as river rocks. The Low Air Loss matrass can also handle a lot more abuse. My wife sleeps with our Toy Ratty. On the Alternating Pressure Pad the dog would have busted it.
Really my wife's sore wasn't that bad till I put her on an alternating pressure pad. The vinyl holds in heat and breaks down the skin plus can incubate undesirable bacteria.
We had something like the Xcell for my dad. And a hospice worker provided by Medicare. It was 3 days a week for a couple hours a day. They bathed, turned, etc.
The rest of the time I was fortunate to be able to move in for a while and help out. He was at least capable of getting up and into a wheelchair so the bedsore problem was limited.
What about looking for a qualified individual, rather than a company, willing to live for just room and board?
There is assisted living for Memory Care if you need it because he starts to walk off. My sister is 62 and has Dementia. She spent almost three years in Memory Care assisted living. Simply means they have keypad security system so they can't walk off. Her condition since last Thanksgiving got worse and falls were sometimes a multi times a day event so a couple months ago we put her in a nursing home. They can do things assisted living can't like passive restraints and you get certified help. She's had two falls now in three months a huge improvement fall wise but her mental state seems to be on a rapid decline now.
hospicare provided the mattress, bed, aide and drugs, i can't say enough good things about hospicare
I can't either really. My dad was terminal with cancer. We had a choice of facility hospice or home hospice. We chose home hospice. I had to call them several times in the middle of the night for things like stepping up pain meds. All medications were delivered and I dispensed them, a nurse and a CNA, as well as a Chaplain, and caseworker came out several times a week usually every other day as far as nurse and CNA went.
When dad passed they were there within minutes. They called the funeral home we designated and they called all the rental equipment providers etc and they got in and out fast taking down the equipment. The Chaplain and a neighbor who is a preacher did his service. Hospice helps even after the person has passed. They are also there to tell you what you need to do etc.
100%... they made it so my Mom could die in her own home with love care and dignity
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